Despite having witnessed their National Assembly representative serve as the country’s prime minister for a short stint, the residents of NA-266 have not enjoyed much state patronage

As soon as one enters the inner localities of the town, one is overwhelmed by the stench from the often overflowing sewage drains. Waste water runs in open drains that act as the only outlet for the sewage from the houses. And when these drains overflow, the pavements are awash with sewage. However, the residents of the area appear to pay no attention to the filth: they wade through it as do their children who play in these surroundings as if in a park.

This is Dera Allahyar, the district headquarters of Jafarabad district. The town is 12 kilometres from Rojhan Jamali — the hometown of former prime minister and one of Balochistan’s most prominent politicians, Zafarullah Khan Jamali. In the entire town only a small building testifies to the fact that this town, the district it falls into and the adjoining district of Nasirabad have, election after election, returned Jamali to the National Assembly. Housing a 50-bed hospital, the building stands out in the midst of the squalor of Dera Allahyar, so far untouched by the filth of its environs. Established during the short prime ministership of Jamali, the hospital is yet to carry out any surgeries in its operating rooms, and apart from an ear, nose, and throat specialist, it houses no other specialists.

However, Dr Abdul Rasheed Jamali, medical superintendent of the District Headquarters Hospital in Jafarabad, is confident that this will change soon. “We have 70 to 80 per cent of the equipment for an operating theatre. Two out of five female doctors are in Quetta on a two-year training course which is likely to be completed in March 2008,” after which he says the hospital will be able to carry out Caesarean operations. Already, he says, the hospital treats around 250 outpatients every day. However, the patients do not paint an equally rosy picture. “The staff at the hospital store often refuses to give us the expensive medicines,” a patient at the hospital tells the Herald.

Nonetheless, it cannot be denied that the town has proven to be far more fortunate than the rest of the constituency. Take, for instance, a Basic Health Unit (BHU) in Aliabad Gola village in Jafarabad’s Sohbatpur tehsil. It caters to 3,350 residents of Aliabad as well as 10 other villages. Riaz Ahmed, a medical technician who runs the BHU, says that like the 18 others in the district, he gets 20,000 rupees for medicines every quarter. The 44 civil dispensaries in the district, on the other hand, are allocated just 15,000 rupees each. Lack of funds is just the tip of the iceberg: around 50 per cent of BHUs and hospitals in the constituency face an acute shortage of doctors and medicines. In fact, medical technicians, instead of medical officers, treat patients in the BHUs, while the civil dispensaries are handled by dispensers and female health workers instead of doctors.

“BHUs and civil dispensaries run out of the medicines in just a month and a half,” Ahmed adds. Most of the patients in the rural areas complain of stomach-related diseases due to the unavailability of potable water, he points out.

Ahmed’s words come as no surprise as there are no water supply lines to the rural areas and the villagers consume water from irrigation channels that is stored in ponds: cattle, stray dogs and other animals drink from the same source. The situation in the towns is no better where water is again stored in unclean ponds that dogs can be found swimming in.

Health problems are further compounded by the dirt tracks that alternate as roads in most district towns. The passing vehicles disturb the dust continuously which is a leading cause of respiratory problems suffered by the residents. The villages, too, have dirt tracks which not only lead to health problems but also make access to education, health and other social services very difficult. For instance, the village Mir Jagan Khan Umrani Goth, in Nasirabad district, is linked to the main Nasirabad Road by a dirt track. It takes the village residents one hour to reach the road. As the village does not have a BHU, the people have to travel to one in another village – Haji Dildar Khan Umrani Goth – where a medical technician runs the unit. “In case someone gets bitten by a snake, we have to take the patient all the way to Dera Allahyar which is about 40 kilometres away,” says Allah Warayo, a resident of Mir Jagan Khan Umrani Goth. Similarly, pregnant women in Goth Rahib Ali Umrani in UC Manjothi have to be transported 45 kilometres to Jacobabad, Sindh. “Women often die on the way to the hospital,” says a resident.

While the government claims that it has spent considerable funds on development projects in the area, the local residents point to the conditions they live as belying such assertions. “Ninety per cent of our politicians are corrupt and they have done nothing for the people of their constituencies,” says Khair Bakhsh, a 75-year old resident of Dera Allahyar.

The disillusionment of the people is not off the mark: six months into the new fiscal year and the district government of Jaffarabad, for instance, has still not presented its budget. According to Khan Mohammad Jamali, the nazim, the district government has done this to protest against the provincial government’s refusal to provide funds. “The Balochistan Development Authority claims that it has completed sewerage projects at a cost of 100 million rupees each in Dera Allahyar and Usta Mohammad tehsil but the people have witnessed no improvement in the system,” he adds.

The state of affairs in the education sector is no better: lack of funds and pilferage of the ones available are common problems. In Dera Allahyar, for instance, some schools lack buildings and children are forced to study out in the open. Haji Ghulam Sarwar Katore Primary School is a case in point. Some 250 students sit outside as the school has only one classroom. “The dropout rate among schoolchildren is 40 per cent due to lack of facilities,” Haji Abdul Wahid Khosa of the School Teachers Association, Jafarabad, tells the Herald. According to him, the district government failed to provide free course books to over 75 per cent of the students during the current academic year.

There is just one intermediate college for boys and one for girls in Dera Allahyar. “However,” points out Khosa, “the girls’ college does not have its own building and holds its classes in a building that belongs to the Labour Department. And as no female teaching staff is available, the instructors of the boys’ college have to give the lectures.” Another major problem that the region faces is that of shortage of electricity: power failures are routine in Dera Allahyar. The only exception to this appears to be Rojhan Jamali, which has its own grid station — thanks to Jamali. Such small mercies are perhaps the reason many an individual is willing to argue that the constituency would have been in a better state had Jamali been allowed to complete his term.

“Jamali tried his best, initiating a number of projects during his tenure as prime minister, including a cadet college in Jafarabad, construction of the Dera Allahyar-Jacobabad Bypass and the provision of gas and power supply to several villages,” says Ali Hasan Qadri, a labour leader. Nevertheless, whether Jamali’s achievements or failures will help his brother, Abdul Rehman Jamali, who is contesting the 2008 election from this constituency, remains to be seen. It will not be long before we find out but sceptics are not very hopeful of what the new victor will bring for the people.