As the date of the UN Secretary-General led follow-up meeting of member-state and regional-organization special envoys on Afghanistan draws closer, political activism of the Taliban ousted figures in exile have intensified. Former governors, members of the parliament, affiliates of the political parties and the occupants of the higher echelons of power within the Afghan state have been active and vibrant. Familiar faces that dominated the Afghan political scene for two decades appear on media advertising new alliances and issuing statements in a bid to remind people involved in the Afghan affairs about their existence. This has been a successful ploy of the political elite over the decades and it has worked in their favor throughout Afghan conflict in general and over the course of last years in particular.
While the former political figures have been successful in attracting the United Nations and other actors’ attention, there has hardly been analysis of the impact of their engagement. If pre-August 2021 peace negotiations are anything to go by, it may not be difficult to recognize the fact that the Taliban has not had an appetite for engaging with them. The limited encounters that did take place were more of ceremonial nature with no real bilateral engagement between the two sides of the table. Post August 2021 and after the Taliban ascend to power, the clarity has further emerged that the de facto authority is in no mood to dialogue and negotiate with the collective that the Taliban claim to have fought for two decades.
Besides measuring effectiveness of the exiled at the negotiation table with the de facto authorities, gauging public trust and interest in them is another, far more important aspect of the equation that needs consideration. While there is no formal opinion poll, going by Afghan mainstream and social media, one can clearly see that Afghans’ faith in the individuals and faces that represented them both at home and abroad starting from Bonn Conference in 2001 has faded. People of Afghanistan remember their destabilizing agendas motivated by personal interest and that of their groups.
Afghanistan once again emerged on the central agenda of the global community after the events of September 2001 that resulted in the intervention of international community in the country. After two decades of conflict and civil war, it was an opportunity for Afghanistan to regain its progress on the road to stability and development. The international donor community made serious investments for two long decades on social, economic and political development of Afghanistan. Introduction of a democratic state system, infrastructure and human capital development, institution building and investment on community mobilization, integration and civil engagement are a few to name that offered hope to the people of Afghanistan. A good indicator of public enthusiasm was nationwide participation of people in 2004 elections. However, all this development and progress was challenged on each and every turn of the two decades long epoch of republic by the same political elite.
Among the political exiles are those who constantly challenged the state authority and legitimacy by clinging to governmental positions exploiting ethnocentric political narrative, financial capital accumulated through illegal means and their ability to destabilize geographical areas of their dominance with the help of the warlords they housed and protected. Electoral rigging, post-election wrangling for security of their political interests and subsequent power sharing frustrated people with political processes. The wide spread corruption was world known phenomena that placed Afghanistan on the lower tiers of global corruption indices. Promoting social unrest through fueling ethnic tensions among people damaged social fabric of Afghanistan and constantly winded chasms among the Afghan communities that halted social integration and development. These are very few of the many ills that were inflicted on Afghanistan amidst a once in ages opportunity due to which Afghanistan regressed to where it is today.
The international community should have realized the destabilizing impact of the so-called political personalities who played a leading role in the disastrous civil war that was widely fought across Afghanitan after regime collapse in 1992. Most of the post-2001 political elite were either patrons or participants in the civil war of 1990s. However, the UN facilitated Bonn process placed them in the front row of the negotiation table to decide upon future of the country. Consequently, most of the predators of the civil war at once became the political elite of Afghanistan. Instead of being tried as part of transitional justice, the warlords made it to the aisles of power and more importantly, with an opportunity to further strengthen their positions by milking government and international community’s resources accumulated from kickbacks, corruption and misuse of authority besides winning contracts of supplies and service delivery from the international organization through their political influence.
It goes without saying that those who constantly threatened the state, collected enormous wealth over the years and enjoyed every bit of luxury during their time in power, fell like ninepins and escaped the country leaving people of Afghanistan without leadership giving direction and guidance. Afghans still remember that fatal August fortnight concluding on 15th August when the self-imposed political elite left them amidst chaos and uncertainty in a bid for personal survival. As such, their current effort of gaining relevance and recognition is seen as nothing but an endeavor to restore their position besides reclaiming their assets and wealth they left behind after their escape from Afghanistan.
The United Nations and other stakeholders, as well as facilitators of dialogue among Afghans will have to look beyond the deadwood. The captured chess pieces have proven to the people of Afghanistan more than once that the warlords turned political figures are merely bothered about their personal interest and they hardly care about Afghan and Afghanistan. They had their chances not once, but twice and they miserably failed on both occasions. Their failure, however, has caused catastrophe, instability and brought calamity on the people of Afghanistan who are faced with egregious humanitarian situation that is being barely managed with the help of UN facilitated humanitarian assistance.
Learning from the past, the international community will have to change its course and start looking for viable alternatives. Afghanistan needs objective dialogue for political stability, transition and more importantly sustainable positive peace. There do exist substitutes to the tested and tried collective. The substitutes also have a vision for future of the country that lies beyond power sharing, armed violence and power grab through illegal means. Afghanistan is no more capable of facing another 1990s kind of civil war or political mayhem enshrined in power sharing of 2000s, the only solutions that the warlord turned politicians can offer.
Afghanistan has been able to produce an intellectual cadre over the course of last 20 years that is able to think through political transformation and offer a practical roadmap for the future of Afghanistan. Given the circumstances, a sizeable community of these intellectuals has been established in exile and a reasonable number of them are in Afghanistan too with firsthand experience of the ground realities. The international community will have to invest time and resources to map and identify them. An engagement with such groups and individuals will pave the way for communication and rendezvous with Taliban while also helping an alternative, more objective stream of Afghan leadership to discuss, debate and negotiate future of Afghanistan.
The diaspora intellectual community has started recovering from the shock of August 2021 and has gradually gathered themselves. They have been getting organized within different institutional structures in order to create space for internal dialogue, develop coherence in their vision and agree on a common agenda for future. Similarly, there are strong voices inside Afghanistan who have been able to play a pivotal role in raising concerns of the people and sharing them with the de facto authorities. These political and civil society activists, and intellectuals can play a critical role in leading a constructive dialogue, participating in objective discussion and mobilizing the reminder of the Afghan intellectual community who is in fringes at the moment.
It is the right time for the international community led by the United Nations to learn from the history and take corrective measures while facilitating dialogue on Afghanistan. Repeating mistakes of the past and continuing with those who have been part of the problem will not help but further compound the situation by creating impasses between the Taliban regime and the Afghan political community. The impasses are doomed to block two-way communication between the de facto authorities and as such search for sustainable solution can go astray. At minimum, all efforts such as the upcoming Doha meeting, may fail to deliver the desired result which will subsequently diminish the little hope attached to the UN led efforts.
Afghan Outlook 