Fri May 18, 2012
Soldiers in Afghanistan
Peace – A Forgotten Word in Afghanistan
By Ahmad Fayaz Rahmany, California – October 2010
For so many years, I have been thinking about the word, peace. But all I know about this word is that it sounds nice – gentle and smooth – something suggestive of a very good meaning. But what it really means, I don’t know. I have never seen it, never touched it and never felt it during the 30 years of my life.
For Afghans, peace is imaginary. It is a just a word hanging in front of their eyes. The further they walk, the further it goes away. It is something that has been promised but people believe they will never, ever attain it.
After so many decades of war and violence, the people of Afghanistan have had small glimmers of peace such as when the Taliban was first overthrown with the help from the international community. Then hopes of a newly elected government, a practicable democracy, social justice, infrastructure and a civilization that could enjoy friendly relationships with the rest of the world empowered every Afghan to believe that peace was real. But now those hopes are vanishing.
After the 2009 presidential election, people lost their trust in the government. That election was discredited because of fraud and ballot stuffing and voter turnout was low.
The very same conditions were prevalent during the last parliamentary elections in September. People were concerned about security, election fraud and corruption and wondered whether their vote really mattered. As a result there was low voter turnout.
But this last election could have been the perfect opportunity for the international community to prove that our country could elect a new president peacefully – an original concept for Afghanistan as since I’ve been alive every change in power has been accompanied by war and revolution.
Even in Afghanistan’s capitol city, Kabul, corruption is widespread and it has created a lack of trust between the public, the government and the international community with the Afghan government. This corruption has become like a cancer that is being spread like a virus throughout Afghanistan.
This virus will not go away by training and adding troops to a security force. Adding troops only means spending more money on war – money Afghanistan doesn’t have.
Just eliminating the Taliban will not bring peace and prosperity to the country. Afghanistan needs so much but what it needs most is a systematic, trustworthy, honest, strong, free-of-corruption government.
The international community must work with all Afghans, not only tribes, or with leaders in specific provinces or certain regions of the country. Afghanistan belongs to many different ethnic groups and a viable government must represent them all.
Afghans are a noble family. They are religious, peaceful, productive, hospitable, civilization lovers and potentially great partners to the rest of the world. Our streets are not full of terrorists. Our farms are not full of opium, and Afghan women are not tortured in every single house. These are relatively small issues illustrated as very big ones by today’s media….
Presence of foreign military forces in Afghanistan is not very ideal as it causes more human loss. Afghans don’t like to be ordered around with guns pointed at them. Not only it doesn’t help, it creates a more hostile situation. At the same time a troop withdrawal at current situation can cause a chaos as every political party would want to get into power. If money is to be spent in Afghanistan, it should be spent on building infrastructure and investing in honest and strong local and central governments. If insecurity cannot be achieved in remote areas, there are other places which have some level of security and these places can become models for the rest of the country.
In 2002 there were lots of secure places in Afghanistan. Now those places are few and far between. Maybe in the future there won’t be any secure place in Afghanistan and maybe war will remain the only course of action….
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