Hundreds of Afghans went to the passport office in Kabul on Wednesday, barely a day after it was announced that it will reopen this week to issue the passports, despite Taliban Security Forces having to fend off part of the throng in order to keep order.

The service, which had been halted since the Taliban’s takeover and the fall of the previous government in August, trapped thousands of people anxious to escape the country, will restart on Saturday, according to Taliban authorities.

“I came to acquire a passport, but as you can see here, there are a lot of difficulties, and the system isn’t working,” Mahir Rasooli, one of the applicants, told Reuters outside the office.

“There is no one here who can answer our inquiries or tell us when we should arrive. People are perplexed.”

Requests for comment were not immediately returned by a spokeswoman for the Taliban authorities in charge of the passport service.

Since the Islamist movement gained control of Afghanistan, which was already suffering from drought and the COVID-19 epidemic, poverty and famine have increased.

Half a million people have been displaced in recent months, the United Nations says, and the number will only grow if health services, schools and the economy break down.

The hundreds who descended on the passport office came despite advice that distribution of passports would only begin on Saturday, and initially only for those who had already applied.

The crowd pressed against a large concrete barrier, trying to hand documents to an official who stood atop it, in a scene reminiscent of the chaos at Kabul airport in the last stages of evacuation after the withdrawal of U.S. troops.

The official urged them to return home and come back on Saturday.

“I am here to receive a passport, but unfortunately I couldn’t,” said a man in the crowd, Ahmad Shakib Sidiqi. “I don’t know what we should do in this condition.”

The bleak economic outlook drives their desire to leave, said Sidiqi and Rasooli.

“There is no job and the economic situation is not too good, so I want to have a good future for my kids,” said Rasooli.

Sidiqi said he wanted a passport to accompany a member of his family to neighboring Pakistan to seek medical treatment, but added they had no choice except to leave.

“We have to leave Afghanistan,” he said. “It is a bad situation in Afghanistan – no job, no work. It is not a good condition for us to live.”

The Taliban have said they welcome international aid, though many donors froze their assistance after they took power.