COMMENT Karzai culture spreads
disillusionment By Inge
Fryklund
Although the war in Afghanistan -
with its tally of US combat deaths now exceeding
2,000 - has largely faded from the news, it is
useful to consider why the conflict is so
intractable. Why has a campaign that initially
seemed so hopeful resulted in a country that is
politically fractured and increasingly deadly for
Afghans and foreign militaries alike?
One
clue can be found in the country's governance. The
initial promise of inclusive and accountable
Afghan government, embodied in the constitution
approved by the 2003 Loya Jirga, has been
squandered.
The Afghan constitution
provides for a more highly centralized government
than is historically congenial to Afghanistan, but
this centralization is balanced by the
constitutional requirement for the
direct election of
mayors and of district, city, and village councils
- a return to the pre-Soviet practice of locally
elected offices and locally managed affairs.
The Karzai government, however, has chosen
not to implement any of these provisions, and the
international community has acquiesced. Instead,
President Karzai appoints all mayors, and the only
district and city councils are those organized and
funded by the international community. The
(non-existent) district councils are supposed to
appoint members of the Meshrano Jirga, the upper
house of Parliament, providing district input at
the national level. Provincial councils are indeed
elected per the constitution and appoint a member
to the Meshrano Jirga, but under a decree signed
by President Karzai in 2005, their powers are
mostly advisory.
The result is a complete
lack of official mechanisms for governmental
accountability at the provincial, district, or
municipal level; citizens simply have no recourse
if local officials are corrupt or fail to deliver.
Much of the insurgency may well be driven - or
passively encouraged - by the sheer lack of
avenues for peaceful local political choice. Few
insurgents are ideologically "Taliban."
In
2005, I heard an Afghan-American professor
speaking in Kabul postulate that this lack of
local accountability was the root problem in
Afghanistan and the main driver of the insurgency
- which was then barely noticeable to the rest of
us. As he put it, under this system, "Afghans
aren't citizens; they are subjects." All the
Afghans in the room cheered. Nearly eight years
on, we are reaping the fruits of that lack of
accountability.
Afghanistan has a number
of large cities - Kandahar, Jalalabad, Herat,
Mazar-e-Sharif, and of course Kabul - that should
be engines of economic growth and participatory
politics. Instead, mayors are appointed to advance
the president's interests rather than to address
local needs. While municipalities must support
themselves by raising their own taxes, their
budgets, hiring decisions, and salaries are all
set in Kabul. Americans would never stand for such
lack of control over local affairs, so why should
we expect the Afghans to tolerate it?
US
support of the Karzai government is only
facilitating the top-down control that in turn
helps to drive the insurgency, and the United
States is seen to be supporting the Kabul
government against the interests of the average
Afghan. In the absence of structural
accountability, US-led anti-corruption efforts -
which consist mostly of urging the Karzai
administration to prosecute wrongdoers - are no
challenge to the regime. Worldwide, the single
most effective anti-corruption tool is electoral
accountability. In the United States, we can
"throw the bums out." Afghans have no such option.
The continued lack of Afghan governmental
accountability will continue to constrain economic
activity, alienate citizens, and fuel the
insurgency. It is likely to lead to more US and
North Atlantic Treaty Organization deaths before
the withdrawal, and more instability afterwards.
An insurgency driven by lack of
accountability cannot be eliminated by military
force. Only altering the institutions of
government can change the dynamic.
Decentralization of power would go a long ways
towards improving life at the local level and
eliminating the need for insurgency as a mechanism
for political opposition. Given the current
constitution, local officials could be elected,
and real power devolved by statute.
While
the consequences of lack of accountability are
primarily manifest at the provincial and local
levels, the accountability problem can only be
addressed by Afghan national policy. The Karzai
government has demonstrated that it has no
interest in local accountability. It is time for
the international community to insist that
Afghanistan fully implement its own constitution
as a quid pro quo for further support.
Between now and 2014, there is time to
reduce that part of the insurgency that is
anti-Karzai (and, by association, anti-American)
rather than pro-Taliban, and leave a legacy of
permanent sustainable institutions of sub-national
government. In the run-up to the 2014 presidential
election, local elections could also serve to
broaden the political space and allow potential
candidates to demonstrate their ability to govern.
Expanding elected government would help
Afghanistan's putative democracy mature beyond its
current centralized, "winner take all" dynamic,
and create multiple bodies of authority to help
draw more citizens into the political process.
This is a legacy that we can leave for
Afghanistan.
Local accountability is the
closest thing to a silver bullet that we are
likely to find in Afghanistan. We should use it.
Inge Fryklund was a Chicago prosecutor
during the 1980s. From 2004 to 2012, she spent
more than four years in Afghanistan
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
