10 Paktika districts still without telecommunication services

SHARANA (Pajhwok): Residents of 10 districts in southeastern Paktika province are still lacking access to telecom services and as a result their routine activities are affected.

However, the provincial Telecommunication and Information Technology department says the 10 districts have been surveyed and will be brought under telecom coverage soon.

Wazakhwa, Dila, Khoshamand, Terwa, Warmami, Gomal, Nimatabad, Chaharbaran, Nika and Ziruk are the 10 districts out of Paktika’s 24 districts whose residents have no access to telecommunication services.

A tribal leader of Warmami district Baloch told Pajhwok that no telecommunication network worked in their district.

“In the absence of telecom services, we are facing numerous problems. We have to travel from district to another for minor work or to inform each other. When we have a patient, we cannot contact the driver.”

An influential figure in Wazakhwa district, Khoshal told Pajhwok Afghan News their district remained backward due to the lack of telecommunication services.

“Due to the lack of telecom services, no one is willing to work in this district. Government or NGO employees once come here, they do not come again, they say the area is like a prison.”

He urged the government to provide telecom services to these districts first before providing them with other facilities of life.

Ghamai, a resident of Gomal district, also said residents were facing many problems in the absence of telecom services in the district. He said Gomal residents were deprived of other facilities of life besides telecom services.

He says: “The government should extend telecom services to the remaining districts of Paktika so that the people of these districts are connected to the world.”

The provincial Telecommunication and Information Technology department says efforts are being made to extend telecom services to the mentioned district and a technical survey in this regard has been completed.

Syed Ibrahim Jahid, ATRA head at the department, told Pajhwok: “We are trying to bring under telecom coverage all the districts of Paktika which do not have the services. In this regard, the survey of these districts has already been completed.”

He said telecomm companies and ATRA would work jointly to extend telecommunication services to these areas in the coming year.

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