Bio

Waqar has spent the last eleven years working in international development and humanitarian relief — first with UN-HABITAT on housing reconstruction after the 2010 floods, then with UNHCR on Afghan refugee documentation in KPK, and currently as a senior programme manager with a UK-based INGO running education access projects in southern Punjab and Sindh. He has worked in nine of Pakistan's provinces and has a ground-level understanding of this country that most people in his income bracket simply do not have. He is one of the most well-travelled Pakistanis without ever having needed to leave the country though he has worked in Jordan and Kenya briefly. He is fluent in Urdu, Punjabi, Saraiki and working Sindhi. Despite years of exposure to the worst of human circumstance, he is not cynical, he calls it 'maintained optimism through action.' He lives simply, owns very little, and gives generously. He prays regularly, reads widely, and makes decisions slowly but with complete conviction.