Editorial
Hamid Karzai's new term in office
He must provide clean government to Afghanistan
Hamid Karzai should have no reason to feel complacent now that he has been given another five years as Afghanistan's president. After what has clearly been a flawed election followed by a decision for a run-off followed by the withdrawal from the race of his rival Abdullah Abdullah, the president's hold on power does not look promising. The fact that the election commission has given him a walkover does little to make people inside and outside Afghanistan feel that things will now fall into a pattern. And just what sort of compulsions he might come under has come through the warnings sounded by the United States and other western nations engaged in the war against the Taliban. They have given him six months to clean up the mess that has accumulated over the last five years in Afghanistan. Else they will pull the rug from under him.
There is a sense of irony in the situation. Almost all Afghanistan-watchers believe that Karzai has failed to turn things around in Afghanistan ever since he was installed as its president by the western powers. Corruption has registered a rise. Nepotism and cronyism have undermined the working of his government, which in any case has seen its authority confined to the country's capital. Grave charges of questionable dealings have been levelled at his brother. Whereas by now the Afghan armed forces and police should have been able to take charge of the nation's security, a huge vacuum yet remains, one that the foreign powers now battling the Taliban have been trying to fill. In effect, the sense of insecurity the Afghan people suffered from when Karzai first assumed presidential office is still there. Add to that the damage that charges of ballot stuffing at the recent elections have done to Karzai.
It is, under the circumstances, not quite feasible to suggest that Afghans be given another chance to elect a leader for themselves. That is as much as to suggest that in the coming weeks and months rather than years President Karzai must demonstrate his ability to provide clean, honest leadership to his country. He cannot forever depend on the West to keep him in power. Neither will public opinion in Washington and elsewhere be willing to countenance his presence indefinitely through sending their soldiers to defend his country from the Taliban for him.
It has been a bad time for Afghans. Mr. Karzai, now in the glare of scrutiny, must not make it worse.
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