Annual Report 2008-2009

The statutory mandate of AwazCDS is “to help promote the development of a socio-economic and politically sound society and to improve the living standards of the population of rural and urban slums in Pakistan.” Its core program outreach is in 15 districts of Southern Punjab whereas its mass mobilization and campaigning outreach is in whole of Pakistan. Since our inception in 1995 and later registration under the Societies Registration Act 1860, we aimed to identify and address the causes of chronic deprivation, hunger and injustice prevailing among marginalized communities that relate to their location and the specificities, or characteristics of rural areas, that distinguish them from the urban and which are often not addressed in the mainstream plans and policies of government. The Foundation built the conceptual and empirical basis for understanding and addressing rural issues and demonstrated the value of the rural perspective for the Southern Punjab. Over the course of its evolution, AwazCDS has established itself as a pioneer organisation in recognising and tackling the different dimensions of poverty. Our holistic approach of poverty alleviation, which is based on development.

Annual Progress Report 2008

This is indeed the matter of great pleasure for me to present this annual report of AwazCDS-Pakistan's endeavours for the socio-economic development and political empowerment of marginalized communities in Pakistan during the year 2008. The year brought new hopes and has opened up new avenues as Awaz team commenced the implementation of its third ten years' on, strategic plan (2008-2017) which is comprised of six core and integrated programs and three cross cutting programs with a mission of “Securing the Future of Marginalised Communities”. Awaz got success in expanding its core programs outreach by opening its Field Office Jam Pur, in most deprived district of Rajan Pur in Punjab. The advocacy programmes outreach of Awaz has been expanded from 27 PARC-Networks last year, to all 53 Tehsils of 15 Districts of Southern Punjab. Further to this Awaz has also enhanced its outreach at national and regional level after being elected as the National Coordination Secretariat of Global Call to Action against Poverty (GCAP), a coalition of CSOs, NGOs and human rights activists, peasants, teachers, students unions and labourers across the World. The present report reflects upon the outcomes and impacts of our endeavours through various long term programs and short term initiatives of the period. Besides programmatic expansions and various achievements at policies and practices level changes, Awaz has also attained long awaited institutional strengthening milestone by getting the tax exemption status from Federal Board of Revenue, Government of Pakistan. Despite successes there are always challenges to face with, and Awaz cannot be spared from such challenges at all. The rising waves of terrorism and trends of extremism furthered the insecurity, violence and mistrust in our society. New, so called democratically elected government is also failed to address the challenges related to governance, energy crisis, price hikes and legalized corruption in society. Consequently, the gap between diminishing middle class, poor and ultra poor is increased because of rising poverty, food insecurity and poor livelihood opportunities as well as basic infrastructure facilities. The report shares various case studies pertaining to our successful achievements at grassroots level and we hope it will help public and development sector in building such models particularly in Pakistan and across the World in general. Towards the end, I on behalf of AwazCDS-Pakistan acknowledge the support of all our general body and Board members, management and field staffs, VDCs members, PARC-Networks activists, women and youth groups, GCAP Coalition member organizations and civil society networks for contributing in our development endeavours in achieving our set targets. Finally, I on behalf of AwazCDS-Pakistan must also appreciate the role of our development partners for their technical and financial support as without their invaluable support the tasks were difficult to achieve.

Annual Progress Report 2007

Several challenges like bad governance at all levels, militarization of society, extremism terrorist attacks ,intolerance wide spread corruption ,judicial and political crises and poor public services ,the year 2007 ended at the helm of lawlessness ,insecurity and uncertainty .We declared the said years as the most unfortunate and bloodiest in the recent history of the country The said situation further increased the poverty and human rights violations in our society .Women and children were affected badly as the poor started selling their kidneys as well as their loved ones for the bread. Weak and non democratic state structures always over look inhuman practices. The unprecedented and horrendous changes were experienced at national level on daily basis .Under such circumstances the role of civil society and educated citizenry was crucial therefore it forced us to revisit our set targets and strategies to think beyond and to act more proactively. Overwhelming support from the common masses and participation of communities with which we work was the blessing in disguise and therefore, we are able to achieve our set objectives during this difficult time. Though the report below does not speak about the challenges faced by the nation as a whole both as political and economic front yet you will find main issues of grassroots communities and our efforts to address them .Alongside the outcomes and impacts or our development endeavors in the said period, the report also describes a brief of our new strategic programs which were conceived during this period through a long exercise and strategic thinking processes. The report also describes a brief of our new strategic programs which were conceived during this period through a long exercise and strategic thinking process. The report also shares the information regarding the external evaluations conducted by our partners both at programmatic and financial levels .Further it is also important to inform you that this program year was also declared as the year for focusing on organizational human resource development keeping in view the future needs and for addressing the issues of staff turn outs. The decrease in turn out ratio of staff during this year shows the significance of the decisions taken by the management at right time.

Annual Progress Report 2006

Year 2006 ended up with multiple challenges at national level including, enhanced military operations in Balochistan and Wazirastan in the name of terrorism and for ensuring the so called writ of state in the areas where state organs & institutions had never been there & functional. People disappearances, wide spread corruption, gross violations of human rights, poor social services delivery, involvement of in service and retired army officials in the public organizations and departments leaving no chance of survival to the civilians and subservient parliament, that remained answerable to the military regime rather than the people of the country, are among other major challenges. When we see at the local level the socio-economic and political disparities of the people living in southern districts of Punjab depicts more horrific and vulnerable situation. Under such circumstances the scope for the socio-economic development and political empowerment actions in southern Punjab remained high. With its utmost efforts, AwazCDS-Pakistan could hardly be able to address the issues around certain selected marginalized communities in the region with the effective and efficient utilization of available human and financial resources during said year.

Multi Year Progress Report (2002-2005)

Pakistan is caught in a stage of transformation from a traditional subsistence economy towards one that is progressive and integrated with global economy. In the transformation stage, traditional norms and institutions have given way and new institutions and social norms are restrained from development due to bad governance. The fall out is increasing poverty and inequality. In terms of regional inequality, the districts in Southern Punjab are the worst in Pakistan, except for the districts in Balochistan. Although major problem lies with government practices, however lack of a proactive and progressive minded civil society impedes development activities as well. AwazCDS views lack of organizational capacity among the poor and low-income communities and their lack of access to information and decision making forum as major problems. Customary practices that are both gender insensitive and sustains dogmatic norms has created an immature leadership that is unable to find a way out of the mire of current and emerging problems. Consequently the social, cultural and political environment has become retrogressive and violent. This environment limits coming together of people into groups and restrains leadership building. The local leadership at different levels – household, community, youth, students at educational institutions, local government and provincial government including the government bureaucrats, schoolteachers, village elders, religious leaders, etc. are unable to deal with rapidly changing society and are caught in rat race (unhealthy competition). Inability to compete is compelling them towards violence and to go back to fundamentals. These are obstacle to development of physical infrastructure and social services, breed insecurity and violence and facilitate elite capture of benefits from national development activities.

VOICE FROM THE DEBRIS

I visited the Gale district of Sri Lanka in June 2005, almost a year after the tsunami incident. Gale was declared as the most affected area after tsunami but I was astonished to see that there were no signs of devastation that happened after tsunami. Gale is so alive, that the life was full of colors alongside the seashore of the whole district. This became possible only with the political will of the Sri Lankan government and forward looking attitudes of the people who survived in the catastrophic wave. Unfortunately the real meaning of a failed and non-responsive state was observed by our nation when they witnessed earthquake disaster response on October 8, 2005. AwazCDS-Pakistan while considering the situation as its social and moral responsibility intervened in the earthquake affected areas and started relief and rehabilitation activities. Many people were disagreeing with us when we were complaining against the inability of government departments and authorities for not taking care of 810 earthquake victims properly. They were of the view that government and its institutions were not prepared and since it was a calamity of such magnitude that had not occurred before, therefore we should not blame state functionaries. However it is believed that the voices of thousands buried alive under the debris remained unheard by the rescuers even after weeks. In fact, the lives of thousands of people could have been saved if the rescue operations have been launched timely. Although the international community was quite active yet the state authorities especially the army wanted to handle the situation under its own umbrella because of the geo-political importance of the earthquake affected areas bordering Indian held Kashmir this scenario resulted to further delays in rescue & relief operations. It was noticed that civil society organizations along with the common masses and international community were more responsive towards the needs of the victims than the state authorities.