Historic challenges for Hamid
Karzai By Ashish Kumar Sen
WASHINGTON - Buoyed by the mandate of his
people, Hamid Karzai, Afghanistan's first democratically
elected president, now faces some of the biggest tests
of his leadership.
Karzai was to be sworn into
office in Kabul on Tuesday under the watchful gaze of US
Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld.
The history of the United States and
Afghanistan has become entwined since September 11,
2001, so much so that Karzai's swearing-in on December
7, a landmark day in Afghanistan's history, was already
a poignant landmark in US history - the day the Japanese
attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, in 1941. But in the
months ahead, Karzai will be preoccupied not with the
history of the United States but with the future of his
own country.
In a report issued on Monday,
United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan said that
the year ahead would present many challenges to
Afghanistan's political and economic recovery. "For the
first time, however, Afghanistan will face these
challenges with a directly elected president endowed
with a strong popular mandate," he said.
Karzai's most immediate test will be his cabinet
picks.
Annan said the Afghan leader now has an
opportunity to select an effective cabinet that is able
to extend government authority throughout the country
and deliver basic services. A cabinet that is both
competent and representative of Afghanistan's diversity
will be critical for advancing national reconciliation,
he added.
In an interview before Afghanistan's
October 9 presidential election, Karzai said a victory
would give him a mandate to create a government "very
different" from his team of the past three years.
Karzai received more than 50% of the vote in a
field of 17 candidates.
International agencies
have raised the decibels of their demand for a
"warlord-free cabinet". Human Rights Watch, a New
York-based group, in a letter to Karzai urged the
Pashtun leader to sideline militia leaders and other
officials implicated in past and current human-rights
abuses.
"This is President Karzai's big chance,"
said Brad Adams, executive director of Human Rights
Watch. "He has a popular mandate from the Afghan people.
He should use it to end impunity and warlord rule, now
and forever."
Karzai knows many Afghans expect
to see fewer warlords in power, but he has made it clear
he will not wipe the slate clean. "There are nasty
pieces and good pieces," he insisted in one interview.
Afghanistan's diverse warlord factions, who
fought a bloody civil war in the early 1990s, are by no
means easy allies of one another, said John Sifton, a
New Delhi-based researcher with Human Rights Watch.
"This continuing military factionalism, if unchecked in
coming years, could spark a new civil conflict in
Afghanistan, and put at risk all of the gains and
opportunities presented by the end of the Taliban
[administration] in late 2001."
US officials
insist that warlords have been marginalized. In
Washington recently, the US ambassador to Afghanistan,
Zalmay Khalilzad, noted: "I think that we have made a
lot of progress in breaking the backbone of warlordism
in Afghanistan."
The "balance of power is
shifting decisively in favor of the government ... So I
believe that even the militia leaders recognize that
warlordism is a dying institution and they all want to
have other jobs, to get out of being militia leaders to
do other things. That's an indication that they want to
be part of the future," he said, adding, "Those who do
not cooperate with the process of decommissioning,
civilianizing the militias, I think they don't have a
good future in Afghanistan."
Since taking power
in December 2001, Karzai, now 46, has survived an
assassination attempt and infighting among ethnic
groups.
On a visit to Afghanistan last month, US
Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage was asked
whether the administration of President George W Bush
was encouraging Karzai to exclude warlords from his
cabinet. "President Karzai will make his own decisions
regarding his cabinet, and i am sure he will make
decisions that will assure the greatest possible
benefits for the people of Afghanistan," Armitage
replied.
But, the State Department official
added, "Of course, if President Karzai were to ask our
advice, we have opinions, and we would be glad to give
them to him. But we will let him ask - he is the
president of this nation and he's got the ultimate
responsibility."
Besides the problem of
warlords, Afghanistan, a nation ravaged by decades of
civil war, is, according to a recent United Nations
report, the source of 87% of the world's opium and
heroin.
The "Afghanistan Opium Survey 2004"
released by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime
says opium cultivation in Afghanistan has increased by
64% compared with 2003. "In Afghanistan, drugs are now a
clear and present danger," said Antonio Maria Costa,
executive director of UNODC.
In Kabul, Karzai
spokesman Jawed Ludin said the "struggle against the
narcotics will be one of the top priorities of the
government".
Sifton predicts major political
problems are likely to manifest themselves when Karzai
has to name a new cabinet, and again during the
parliamentary and provincial elections scheduled for
next April. "Simply put, the presidential election is
not Afghanistan's main political pressure point," he
said.
"The 2005 elections are almost certain to
be marked by widespread political repression and
violence, as factions tighten up their control of local
voting blocs," he added.
A similar opinion was
expressed in a recent International Crisis Group report.
The group notes that though the October presidential
election went well, the parliamentary, provincial and
district elections will be considerably more
complicated, and preparations are going too slowly.
"If the parliamentary vote is delayed again - it
was originally to have been concurrent with the
presidential election - there is a risk that the Karzai
administration's legitimacy will be seriously
tarnished," the report said.
Overshadowing all
the preparations are fears about security.
"Insurgents, principally the Taliban but also
Hizb-i-Islami forces loyal to Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, have
made clear their intention to disrupt the elections,"
said the International Crisis Group. "Yet, as the
presidential polls amply demonstrated, Afghans are keen
to participate in the electoral process despite such
threats."
Adams of Human Rights Watch said
Karzai needs to be more frank and vocal about
Afghanistan's security needs. He suggested the Afghan
leader should pressure the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization and the United States to meet their
previous promises to provide troops and help improve
security ahead of next year's parliamentary elections.
Sifton said: "The time to address this emerging
crisis is now, as the world's eyes are on Afghanistan."
By the time of the 2005 elections, he said, it
will be too late to undertake the necessary changes to
improve the county's political situation. The US and its
allies need to clarify their strategy, redouble efforts
to disarm the factions, build up a new army as well as
police forces, and start supporting Karzai
"wholeheartedly".
Despite these seemingly
insurmountable challenges, Khalilzad was optimistic that
once the issue of "Talibanism and narcotics" is dealt
with, "Afghanistan will be well on its way to be a
successful country".
The US envoy added: "And I
think for us, given our stakes in that part of the
world, it will be a huge success. It will be good for
Afghanistan. It will be good for us and good for the
world."
Ashish Kumar Sen is a
Washington-based journalist.
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