Politics in Afghanistan: Cabinet joiners

Nguồn tin: nguontinviet.com

AFTER more than three months of squabbles and infighting, President Ashraf Ghani and his chief executive, Abdullah Abdullah, have at last unveiled a list of ministers to be approved in parliament. The cabinet is the first fruit of the two former rivals’ agreement in September to form a government of national unity, after a disputed presidential election. The much-mocked delay, which has led to a sharp drop in Mr Ghani’s approval ratings, even encouraged the Taliban to chime in on Twitter to the effect that perhaps the cold weather in Kabul, the capital, had frozen the cabinet.

In truth, with two people at the helm, twice the number of campaign loyalists had to be placated, while seeking a reasonably broad cabinet representation by ethnicity, geography and even sex involved much horse-trading. The outcome is, on the whole, a surprisingly young cabinet largely free of the influence both of power-wielding warlords and the notoriously corrupt—both legion under Hamid Karzai, Mr Ghani’s predecessor. Mr Abdullah got an almost equal share of the ministries, including the powerful Ministry of the Interior.

None of the appointed ministers has cabinet experience, though some faces are familiar. The interior minister, Nur ul-Haq Ulumi, now in his 70s, was a general in the communist era. The foreign minister, Salahuddin Rabbani, is a former ambassador and chair of the High Peace Council, which tries to negotiate with factions of the Taliban; his well-known father, a former president, was assassinated in a suicide bombing in 2011. Despite Mr Ghani’s enthusiasm for equality of the sexes, only three women are among the 25 ministerial nominees. One, Najiba Ayoubi, who gets women’s affairs, is a journalist and former employee of Save the Children, an NGO. The two others take information and higher education.

Mr Ghani must now get parliament to approve the cabinet. In the past, that has meant buying votes and currying favour. If Mr Ghani really is serious about battling corruption, he will have to find other means to persuade parliament. Eager though he is to start working, he may not have finished haggling quite yet.

But as soon as the cabinet is in place, Mr Ghani will at last be able to focus on getting things done. The list is long. The economy is a shambles. The drawdown of NATO troops has emboldened insurgents, who are killing Afghan soldiers and police in record numbers. And corruption remains endemic. Finding a cabinet may come to seem the easy bit.

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