WASHINGTON: Lured by billions of dollars in pledges of international aid to Afghanistan, international aid agencies are flooding into Kabul and other Afghan cities.

In Kabul, the most recent list counts 65 international NGOs, 20 UN and other international organizations, and an unknown but sizable number of bilateral aid agencies from Europe, Japan, the United States and other countries. The number of foreign organizations still is growing. It is sometimes difficult to get seats on the UN 50-passenger aircraft that flies six times a week from Islamabad, Pakistan, to Kabul, despite a hefty price for the 40-minute flight of $600 one way or $1,200 round trip.

What the ‘gold rush’ to Afghanistan may be neglecting is the fact that only the creation of effective and enlightened Afghan institutions will achieve those objectives. The foreigners already loom powerful over a cash-poor provisional Afghan government that does not even have the money to pay the salaries of its employees.

The UN has pledged to leave a ‘light footprint’ on Afghan soil. But keeping what will soon be hundreds of foreign organizations working toward common objectives will be like trying to queue up a herd of thirsty mules at a water hole.

One of Afghanistan’s few assets is the thousands of experienced Afghan aid workers who have toiled for years to bring food, health care and shelter to their compatriots. After Sept 11, all the international staff of all aid agencies were evacuated from Afghanistan. For the next two and a half months one of the largest humanitarian aid operations in history was carried out by Afghan and Pakistani truck drivers and Afghan aid workers, delivering food to millions of people despite Taliban harassment, civil war and US bombing.

Afghan leaders of NGOs fear they will be overwhelmed by the international presence in Afghanistan and that their best staff will be lured away by the high salaries paid by foreigners. They are regarded by the UN, aid agencies and international NGOs as contractors rather than full partners. When a foreign NGO arrives in town, they say, the UN agencies almost always give it a position of leadership over the Afghan NGOs.

The Afghan aid workers complain also of Afghans from the diaspora assuming the right to speak for them. The country needs outside help, but it must be rebuilt from within. —Dawn/LAT-WP News Service (c) The Washington Post.