Word: afghanization
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...absurdity of holding an election in an impoverished country with a central government that barely governs and a guerrilla insurgency that has threatened to kill anyone caught voting is illustrative of our current Afghan dilemma. We have been prodding the Afghans to run, from Kabul, a country that has always been governed from the bottom up, valley by valley, tribe by tribe. Karzai has many attributes, but a desire to provide effective governance is off his radar screen. He is good at the traditional form of Afghan politics, creating alliances among tribal and ethnic factions. The money distributed...
Then there are the Afghan voters, some of whom say their patience is wearing thin amid the name-calling. It would be stretched to the limit with a run-off. "This government can do nothing right. Even by cheating, these politicians cannot win," says shopkeeper Siddiq Sadeg. He would not disclose for whom he voted, only saying it was neither Karzai nor Abdullah. And that candidate would remain his choice - if he'd bother to go to the polls again...
...protests. While no one foresees the kind of unrest that followed the disputed Iranian election in June, each candidate's lack of an "organized mechanism" to cope with masses of angered, loosely knit partisans could allow the situation to boil over with time, says Haroun Mir, director of the Afghan Center for Research and Policy Studies. "If one group feels left out, it will create problems for everybody," Mir says. Indeed, Abdullah's campaign manager told an Abu Dhabi-based newspaper last month to predict street violence if Abdullah didn't win. (Abdullah, in damage-control mode, said his manager...
...least two instances, promises to cut off the fingers of those who voted were made good on. The extra time and mounting pressure of a runoff would create a climate that could be readily exploited, according to Mir, by the Taliban or "neighbors who like to meddle in Afghan affairs" - a less-than-subtle reference to Pakistan. "If someone wants to make trouble, it's a good time." (Read about the warlord who is key to Karzai's victory...
...southern Afghan city of Kandahar, Amina, 32, says she was awoken by the explosion of rocket propelled grenades at the edge of her neighborhood on election day. It was one of at least nine rockets that targeted polling stations around the city. She waited several hours troubled by second thoughts before she finally setting out to vote, her four-year-old daughter in tow. "I was very afraid. But I voted because it's my right, just like men do," she says. "Our democracy is young and we must be brave...