Editor in Chief: Moh. Reza Huwaida Friday, March 29th, 2024

NUG Facing Serious Challenges

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NUG Facing Serious Challenges

In the last two years, Afghanistan has been facing unprecedented challenges. However, several major development projects have initiated, launched or completed. But the government has failed to deliver its promises. Thousands of Afghans died in violence. Terrifying groups considerably increased and the government frequently lost control of several districts across the country and hundreds of thousands of Afghans forced to flee their home. Unemployment and corruption is at its peak. Disunity among the Afghans has increased and the country is more fragile than ever. If the International community does not engage immediately, Afghanistan will turn into a second Iraq.
Afghanistan is a facing a complex humanitarian crisis and the National Unity Government (NUG) are harshly accused of failing and not fulfilling their promises given during election. As a result of poverty and joblessness, the Social insecurity such as robbery, kidnapping and explosions in all parts of the country including the capital has become a common practice. On the other hand the illegitimate crisis widely debating in the media. The legitimacy of the National Unity Government (NUG) derived from a political agreement has already expired. Around 70% Afghan citizens are dissatisfied with NUG government; as they defied all types of threats to go to the polls under tough conditions but they have been compelled to pay $3 billion in bribe in a year. As a result day to day people are getting more disappointed!
Although, a number of civil activists and patriotic politicians opposed the make-up two headed government system from the very beginning. Their concern came true, and all Afghans, except the two leaders, acknowledge the debacle of the government two years after its formation. The government not only has failed to deliver in areas of good governance and development, but it also has not fulfilled any of its main commitments agreed upon in the power-sharing agreement. No tangible progress has been made so far with respect to the convention of constitutional Loya Jirga (grand assembly), and satisfactory electoral reforms.
Even, since the beginning, there have been seeing Insincerity and inconsistency, and even turning down the decisions of each other, and disagreeing for a 50 percent share in nearly everything, from key national issues to low-ranking appointments. Over the past two years, they did not make any significant changes to in economic and political arena. Instead, they repeatedly blocked the appointments of individuals who are politically at odds with his team despite the fact everyone has the right to hold a different political vision or standpoint in democratic systems. Similarly, they mostly focused on appointing his own team members in the government, and even their interpretation of the electoral reform is to equally divide the seats of electoral commissions with the both team, though the people will never tolerate the division of electoral commissions under the so-called electoral reforms.  
The National Unity Government (NUG) not only has failed to honour its biggest promise – the fight against corruption--, but the vicious phenomenon and national shame has also become more rampant. Some anti-corruption watchdogs say the NUG was initially expected to take concrete anti-corruption steps, but its performance over the past two years dashed the hopes. As in the previous government, the current government has also made sham promises in the battle against corruption, and has not taken any practical step thereof so far. While the government leaders are bragging about addressing the Kabul Bank scandal case, and the termination of fuel contracts of the Ministry of Defence (MoD) as achievements of their anti-corruption drive, none of government bodies involved in probing the two cases shares the details with media.
Public contracts which were the biggest source of corruption over the recent years still remain a point of serious concern. Even the Chief Executive Officer of the NUG, without further elaboration, accused President Ghani’s close aides of corruption in public contracts a while ago. The massive scale of graft in the National Unity Government finally prompted the US as its biggest supporter to criticize the government. A number of US Senators have blasted Afghan government for failing to curb corruption, and warned of scaling back American assistance to Afghanistan. Robert Menendez, a senior member of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, warned President Barack Obama that failure to address the problem of corruption in Afghanistan could lead to a reduction in the $5 billion yearly aid to the country. Leaders of the National Unity Government have to understand that not only Afghans, but also their international supporters no longer can tolerate the continuance of corruption. Corruption is not only the second biggest challenge for Afghanistan after war it is also one of the root causes of the war. Therefore, given its significance, anti-corruption needs be prioritized, and the struggle against this phenomenon should yield palpable, positive results through practical steps.

Overall, Afghanistan is in a serious economic, political and security crisis! The NUG facing serious challenges which need serious attention of the international community. On the other hand, it needs to be notified that Afghan people are deeply tired of promises. No promise will satisfy them unless they see the real changes in the country such as peace, free corruption government, building infrastructures and so on.

Mohammad Zahir Akbari is the newly emerging writer of the Daily Outlook Afghanistan. He can be reached at mohammadzahirakbari@gmail.com

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