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Former commanders and Taliban among Afghan poll winners
 Final results of Afghanistanâs legislative elections show several former commanders of military factions, three old Taliban officials, women activists and several ex-communists won seats in the new parliament. The results of the September 18 vote for the 249-seat lower house, or Wolesi Jirga, and councils in all 34 provinces were finally released on Saturday, after being delayed by a slow count and accusations of vote fraud. Bissmillah Bissmil, chairman of the United Nations-Afghan Joint Electoral Management Body, described the polls as a milestone in the countryâs transition to democracy. The UN-organised elections were held on a non-party basis, with all 5,800 candidates running as independents, raising fears that a fragmented parliament will emerge, with members focused on parochial issues as they compete for government resources.
| That's often what parliaments do, y'know? Sometimes we call it "representing the interests of their constituents," rather than "focusing on parochial issues." |
President Hamid Karzai has no political party and stayed out of the fray, although several supporters, including two relatives, won parliamentary seats. Yunus Qanuni, leader of an alliance of parties opposed to the US-backed president, also won a seat. The former interior and education minister in Karzaiâs government came a distant second to Karzai in the October 2004 presidential election. Qanuniâs brother Haji Baryali said Qanuni and his allies had hoped to win up to half the seats in parliament but it was unclear if they had achieved that goal.
| My guess is that they didn't, my hope is that they did... |
Qanuni is an ethnic Tajik and a senior leader of an alliance that helped US-led forces topple the Taliban in 2001, whereas Karzai is a Pashtun, the largest ethnic group and the one from which most Taliban were drawn. The vote was mostly based on ethnic lines because of the dominance of the tribes in their respective regions. Turnout was 6.8 million of about 12 million registered voters.
| If you've got a tribal system, which Afghanistan doesn't quite, then you've got to have some sort of proportional representation of the tribes. However, while they Pashtuns are tribal in outlook and organization, the remainder of the country isn't. There are Pashtun chiefs of clans, but Uzbek and Tajik and Hazara clans aren't nearly as much of a factor, and as far as I know none of the other ethnic groups are divided into tribes and subtribes like the Pashtuns are. |
Among others who won seats in the Wolesi Jirga were former president Burhanuddin Rabbani, a conservative ethnic-Tajik cleric from the north who is seen as a Karzai supporter and, according to associates, wants to become chairman of the parliament.
| Rabbani was, justifiably I believe, sour graping for awhile after the Talibs were ousted. He considered himself the legitimate president of Afghanistan, and I think he was. But he stepped down for the Bonn meeting and he's taken a back seat to Karzai. He's conservative, but he's most definitely not the Taliban. |
âI see the parliament as an alliance of Karzai with the fundamentalists,â said Abdul Hamid Mubariz, a politician and a former deputy information minister. âKarzai has made the alliance because of his weakness so it would not be a headache for him. Freedom of expression and democracy will suffer.â
| That last I can agree with. Karzai's had to make some convoluted alliances to assert his control, and he's surprised the hell out of anybody who's been paying attention. Nobody bleats that the Afghan gummint's writ doesn't extend outside of Kabul anymore. |
Parliament is expected to sit for the first time next month in a renovated old assembly building. One of parliamentâs key jobs will be to approve or veto the nomination of cabinet members. An election for a new upper house will be completed by the end of this month.
| Brief, sternly suppressed vision of Robert Byrd in turban, deferring to "Mah distinguished colleague, the distinguished senator from Pashtunistan..." |
Several old armed faction commanders, labelled warlords and accused of war crimes by rights groups, also won seats. Haji Mohammad Mohaqiq, from the Shia Muslim Hazara ethnic minority, won most votes in Kabul province. Former-commander Abdul Rabb Rasoul Sayyaf, a religious conservative, an ethnic Pashtun and a Karzai supporter, also won.
| Interesting, to see that Soddy Arabia's man in Afghanistan is a Karzai supporter. Hek and the Talibs were trying to woo him a couple years ago. I thought he'd bite, but he's a wiley devil... |
Three prominent former Taliban won seats in parliament - ex-commander Haji Mullah Abdul Salaam Rocketi, ex-provincial governor Mawlavi Islamuddin Mohammadi and a senior former security official, Hanif Shah Al-Hussein. Women obtained all 68 seats reserved for them in the Wolesi Jirga, but five provincial council seats in the conservative south and east were left vacant as too few candidates registered.
Posted by: Fred 2005-11-14 |
