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By Khan Wali Khan Basharmal
Bomb blasted, tens of dead and hundreds of injured, no problem! The Taliban attacked the Afghan national army, injuring and killing hundreds, no problem, yet still the Taliban are not terrorists, but insurgents and the Afghan government calls them annoyed brothers, no problem. Hush up, have this as a “shireny” this is not corruption, but “shireny,” no problem.
ISIS is coming and slaughtering Afghans, no problem. The cabinet is being late to be appointed and the NATO conference is another burning question, but no problem. Parliamentarians are not serving the people of Afghanistan, no problem. No electricity for one month in Kabul, no problem.
Mullahs are spreading hate speech on every Friday, no problem. People are openly calling for battle against the government and supporting Daesh, but no problem. The corrupt staff of the elite class is running the government’s bureaucracy, no problem. The youth who supported the presidential candidates, Asharaf Ghani and Abdullah Abdullah, are unemployed, no problem.
President Ashraf Ghani is planning to talk to the senior provincial and central bureaucrats through Skype, but the public services sections, general education, Afghan identity cards office, passport department, higher education, and commerce are all suffering from a poor kind of Anglo Imperialism paper-based documentation. No one thinks about how to sort out the problem and convert this old system into digital style but again, no problem. The electricity borrowed from central Asian states is shorting out and not well managed no problem.
Many visits have been made to different states: China, Saudi Arabia, Germany, Pakistan, and Turkmenistan. The question is how to divide things up, and coordinate with the think tanks of Afghanistan and relevant countries, whatever amount of money (in most cases huge chunk) have been spent on these visits, no problem.
The well-enlightened, broadminded, and educated cream of society is mourning the cruel lynching of a woman on the historical ground of Kabul city’s Shah-e Do Shamshira. This brutal act of killing a woman in public exposed the intrinsic and extrinsic picture of mass based orthodoxy and religious fundamentalism in Afghanistan, but no problem. There is a great need to urge the policymakers and intellectuals to launch a public-oriented freethinking campaign against ignorance, public suppression and dogmatism, in order to end the patriarchal domination of society. Some of the representatives of women in the parliament appreciated the act of lynching an innocent woman in public, but still no problem.
Abraham Lincoln said: “You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.”
Afghanistan and the people of Afghanistan were kept in severe ignorance by the Russians, Americans, Anglos, Iranians, Pakistan’s elite class, as well as own governments, till date. They have been deceived by different tactics and techniques; they have been kept away from the modern sciences and the critical social sciences.
The Afghan people have been told by the previous and some of the current hardliners in the government that freedom of speech is a sin and acting against the specific rules outlined by them. One should not forget that the Europeans got independence and moved towards civilization due to accepting the opposite point of view, by debating and freedom of speech.
Still some of the hardliner ex-warlords consider teaching logic in Kabul University anti-Islamic. They are against women’s rights and the basic rights of Afghans. Promoting fundamentalism and extremism through the educational syllabus, verbal communication and job prestige is something that is not very new, but traditional.
Our President Ashraf Ghani has been declared the second thinker in the world and a successful manager in building the confidence of failed states, but unfortunately our governmental, semi-governmental and private universities teaching staffs are more sympathetic towards ISIS than towards the Afghan people and the government of Afghanistan. The students of our schools, colleges and universities get 100 per cent marks in their final exams, but when they go for higher education to the third world countries then they come back with confused and bewildered minds and fall into psychological ailments on their failures, still for the government it is no problem.
Favoritism and populism are the worst practices and kill the states institutionalization; then why should we not give place instead to team work and national integration. The powerless elements tend to gain power within the government for their vested interests. On the other side, making fools of people in the name of religion and national integration slogans is an interesting game for multidimensional elements in the new government.
The people of Afghanistan exist from hand to mouth in several social and political matters. In this most contemporary period of science and technology, Afghans, a people very famous for courage and confidence, are leading life of misery and disappointment. Our parliamentarians are busy in making money in their personal businesses established under the titles of NGOs, consultancies, and foundations. Our legislative body is bound to make the laws to give freedom of speech, temperament, prosperity, and psychological relaxation to the tensest people of Afghanistan after decades of imposed buffer wars in the name of religion, but still we can say, no problem for parliamentarians.
Our elite class or political class is such a strong and hardworking wing that they don’t sleep at night because they want to do bargaining on the interest of people. They have good drink parties in the nights of Kabul and have discussions in detail about their interests, while struggling for getting or approving their project proposals. Our legislators are enough gentlemen as they spend the time during night parties with new coming ministers in bargaining, instead of using the concerns of the people of Afghanistan, while giving their vote only to the ministers who are professional, devoted, and committed, but these qualifications exist only on paper. The parliamentarians are not worried about the qualifications, but only in their vested interests.
We are wondering about the thousands of promises made to the people of Afghanistan by the national unity government leaders, which are not taking place and nobody is planning to bring into power the awareness of mass to struggle for a peaceful and durable Afghanistan. This is only possible through a stable economy and making opportunities for employment in Afghanistan, as well as the production of raw material into national products.
On the other hand, we must invite people to take part in the progress of the nation, and we understand that they are the only source that can help in building the nation. Institutionalization of our organizations, professionalism, and work like management can only address issues faced by Afghans, despondency and war.
The writer is a lecturer and writes mostly on social, political and security issues. He can be reached at: [email protected]
