Political Alliance Creates Strange Bedfellows

A newly-formed political coalition in Afghanistan, the National United Front, brings together a broad assortment of former mujahedin leaders from most of the groups that fought the Soviet-backed communist regime in the Eighties. However, the inclusion of several communists has left observers wondering who exactly the alliance is opposing.



The stated goal of the National United Front, or Jabhe-ye-Motahed-e-Milli, is nothing less than an overhaul of the present system of government.



“We have both long-term and short-term strategies,” said Sayed Mustafa Kazimi, spokesperson for the new group. “We will begin in the short term with government reforms, and if need be we will change the system of government from a presidential to a parliamentary one.”



Kazimi told IWPR that the all-embracing composition of the alliance is proof that former enemies can work together in a democratic manner.



“Our movement goes beyond ethnic or regional boundaries; it is a gathering of influential political figures,” he said. “Unless we form these kinds of movements, the ethnic and local tensions will persist.”



The National United Front includes members of factions that fought each other bitterly in the Eighties and Nineties. First come the “jihadi” parties - Jamiat-e-Islami led by Burhanuddin Rabbani and Hezb-e-Wahdat, headed by Afghan vice-president Karim Khalili. Then there is General Abdul Rashid Dostum’s Junbesh-e-Milli-e-Islami, which was allied with Jamiat in the “Northern Alliance” of the Nineties.



But the alliance also includes two prominent figures from the communist government of President Najibullah, ousted by the jihadi factions in 1992.



Sayed Muhammad Gulabzoi was interior minister in that government and a member of the Khalq faction of the then ruling People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan, PDPA; while Noor-ul-Haq Ulumi belonged to the rival PDPA faction called Parcham, and commanded government forces fighting the mujahedin in southwest Afghanistan. Both men are current members of parliament.



Gulabzoi told reporters that one of the main goals of the new front was to shift power from the chief executive to the legislature.



“We want to change the constitution, change the form of government from presidential to parliamentary, and have direct elections for mayors and governors,” he said.



Currently, local leaders are appointed by President Hamed Karzai.



The Karzai government is steering clear of comment on the National United Front, merely describing it as part of the country’s growing democracy.



“Everyone has the right to form political parties and movements,” said presidential spokesman Karim Rahimi. “This will help the government’s efforts to democratise the country.”



But observers are not so sure.



“Khalq, Parcham and jihadis coming together – what a surprise!” said political analyst Mohammad Qaseem Akhgar. “They fought each other for years, but now they have a common purpose – to escape retribution for what they did over the past 25 years, and award themselves immunity.”



Fazel Muhammad Oria, an editor and analyst, agrees. “This movement is of no benefit to the government or the people of Afghanistan,” he said. “It will only make things worse.”



In Oria’s view, the National United Front is really a power grab by Jamiat-e-Islami.



“Jamiat opposes the government, and is attempting to infiltrate it,” said Oria.



Oria pointed to the prominent Jamiat members who are highly-placed in the current political line-up, among them Younus Qanuni, the speaker of parliament, and Vice-President Ahmad Zia Massoud, brother of the slain Northern Alliance leader Ahmad Shah Massoud.



However, Oria does not believe the new coalition will not take root in Afghanistan’s current climate. “These figures are well-known to the people and they have no support. They have done nothing for the people or the country; they fought for their own personal gain,” he said.



Given Afghanistan’s violent past, forging political partnerships can be a challenge. The Northern Alliance, for example, was made up of former jihadi leaders whose forces fought among themselves following the collapse of the Najibullah government, and destroyed much of the country in the process.



The Taleban emerged and took hold of Afghanistan largely as a response to the chaos and lawlessness of the civil war years. As the fundamentalists gained power and territory, the jihadi groups withdrew to a small sliver of the country in the northeast.



Because of the extreme brutality of the civil war years, many of these faction leaders – termed “warlords” by Afghans - have been accused of serious war crimes by human rights groups, and there have been calls to bring them to justice.



Many Afghans see the jihadi-dominated parliament as a safe haven for former warlords, and are fearful that their growing power could presage a return to the mayhem of the early Nineties.



“These people are troublemakers,” said Qayum Babak, chief editor of the Jahan-e-Naw monthly in Balkh and a leading political analyst. “They have come together to form an alliance against the government.”



Babak reckons the National United Front will have a limited shelf life because it has no popular backing.



“This is not the first time these people have assembled to form a front. They have made alliances many times in the past, but these did not last,” he said.



Kazimi rejects such criticisms, saying that the coalition was set up to fill a political vacuum. “There has been no party able to cope with the deteriorating situation over the past five years,” he said. “There are a lot of registered parties in Afghanistan, but none of them has been able to fill the gap.”



There are currently more than 80 registered political parties in Afghanistan.



Kazimi acknowledged the challenges facing the new group, but voiced cautious optimism that the front would overcome them.



“There is no guarantee that the National United Front will not break down, but we will do our best to save it,” he said. “Even if it does collapse, we will have lost nothing - we are practicing democracy.”



Ordinary Afghans who have been the real victims of decades of violence look on the new alliance with distaste. Many fear that the National United Front will pave the way for a recurrence of past crimes.



“Looking at those polluted faces, and listening to murderers talking is shocking,” said Fauzia, a resident of the Microrayon district of Kabul. “It doesn’t matter what shape they assume - the people see them for what they are.”



Yama, a student at Kabul University, voiced similar sentiments.



“People who should be brought to justice are running away from it,” he said.



“In the history of Afghanistan, the jihadi leaders and the communists will never be forgotten. They have no place among the people. They governed the country for years and did nothing, so what can be expected from this alliance?”



Hafizullah Gardesh is IWPR’s editor in Kabul. Sayed Yaqub Ibrahimi is an IWPR staff reporter in Mazar-e-Sharif.