Word: campaigners
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...anti-Karzai but as an alternative Karzai, offering the same promises of peace, security and stability with a new face, scrubbed clean of the corruption charges that have dogged the President's recent tenure in power. (The anti-Karzai title more properly goes to Ashraf Ghani, whose campaign is grounded in exhaustive, intelligent - some might say too intelligent - and effective policy initiatives that get to the root of the country's problems.) Change and hope are Abdullah's slogans, though like Karzai's, his leadership abilities seem to be based more on personal charisma and networking than on decisive problem...
...corruption and injustice. "Give me the power, so that I can return the power to you," he declares at his rallies - a catchphrase that has become another slogan. Yet even his supporters are vague about how, exactly, he plans to fulfill those promises. Saied Hussain Fakhri, 20, a campaign worker at the Kabul office, as well as a candidate in the provincial assembly elections being held the same day, says he chose to work for Abdullah because he felt that the candidate "really supports youth on all angles." Yet when asked how Abdullah planned to address issues of youth unemployment...
...only helped defeat the Soviets but was also the Taliban's most effective enemy. Massoud was assassinated, some say as a gift from al-Qaeda to the Taliban, by suicide bombers posing as TV journalists on Sept. 9, 2001. Massoud has been the cornerstone of Abdullah's campaign: his image shadows that of Abdullah's on many campaign posters, and before Abdullah spoke at last week's rally, he visited Massoud's tomb on a hilltop in Panshir. But Massoud, who is seen as a hero in large swaths of northern and eastern Afghanistan, is widely despised by the southern...
Though violence has stalked Abdullah's campaign - a campaigner was shot and injured in an attack in nearby Laghman province while Abdullah was in Panshir - that is hardly unusual in Afghanistan: Fahim's retinue too has been attacked, as have several aides to Ashraf Ghani. But expected violence in the country's south may be of benefit to Abdullah. Election authorities estimate that some 700 out of 7,000 polling stations nationwide will not be able to open on the day of elections due to violence, most in the Pashtun-dominated south where Karzai is favored, possibly depriving...
...fraud, he says, but assures TIME that his popularity will overcome any poll manipulation. "You can play with numbers through vote-rigging or through using the state apparatus. But you cannot ignore the sentiments of the nation. Karzai doesn't have that kind of support." Last week, Abdullah's campaign manager, Abdul Sattar Murad, told the Dubai-based National newspaper that his team would actively reject a result that had Karzai winning in the first round, saying the only way the incumbent could get 50% of the vote would be if he resorted to "50 percent of [the corruption...