Afghanistan’s Democracy Fatigue

When Afghanistan held presidential elections in 2004, Haji Kabeer, a 68-year-old villager from Helmand province, trekked to the polling booth, bringing along the women in his household.

The Taliban had warned us not to, he said, but we voted anyway, believing elections would bring us a better future.

Five years later, Kabeer cant see the point in taking the same risk again. His province has been the scene of vicious fighting between insurgents and NATO troops, and he, like many villagers in the south, feels trapped in the middle of their battle. The Taliban has distributed night letters in his area, warning villagers of dire consequences for participating in the coming electoral process.

Moreover, he views the government of President Hamid Karzai as corrupt and ineffectual, and complains that democracy has brought no tangible improvements to his area, such as roads, schools, and health clinics.

I am not voting for Karzai again; thats for sure, Kabeer said, adding that he knew few people in his tribe who planned to cast a ballot at all. I doubt there will be a strong turnout in this area.

Kabeer expressed an oft heard sentiment across the countrys southern and eastern provinces, where many Afghans feel let down by the democratic process. Its an attitude that should have the international community worried as it prepares to support what will surely be a complex and dangerous election process. For Afghanistans presidential elections to be credible and their results accepted, all ethnic groups in every region of the country must feel included.

In recent weeks, the Afghan capital has been embroiled in a debate over when Afghanistan should hold its presidential election. Now that the Election Commission has officially set the polling date for Aug. 20, opposition leaders are calling for Karzai to step down when his official term ends in May. The constitutional crisis has consumed Kabuls political elite and dominated media coverage, thus disguising the wider dilemma in the countrys troubled and predominantly Pashtun south. There, many ordinary Afghans are wondering why another round of elections is being held at all.

Indifference among Pashtuns, and in many cases, an outright hostility toward the entire voting process, stands in stark contrast to the widespread optimism felt ahead of the October 2004 presidential vote, when millions of Afghans from across the countrys ethnic spectrum lined up to cast their ballots, even in remote districts of the Pashtun south where U.N. organizers feared low turnout.

Although the Obama administration has tried to lower expectations, at least domestically, for what it hopes to achieve in Afghanistan, there nonetheless remains broad support for Afghanistan to continue its experiment with democracy, now enshrined in the countrys Constitution. Many political analysts argue that the custom of holding elections, even if some early rounds may be somewhat flawed, eventually builds a stable democratic foundation.

If one were to move away from the electoral process at this moment, a major constitutional crisis would occur, said William Maley, an expert on Afghanistan at the Australian National University. If it came from Karzai it would be seen as a power grab, and if it came from anywhere else it would be rejected by political leaders in the north and west who would say, We have got our act together; why cant the Pashtuns?

Its fair to say that many Afghans had unrealistic expectations for their countrys swift turnaround. Yet it is critical, as the international community and the United States in particular seek to forge a new direction in Afghanistan, to take note of why many Pashtuns have become so disgusted so quickly with the democratic process.

So many promises were made, but so little was done, said Khalid Khan, a medical student in eastern Nangarhar province. People have lost faith in the idea of voting.

Apathy among Pashtuns stems from three overlapping concerns: poor security across the south and east, disenchantment with the Karzai government and NATO, and a growing sense that their ethnic group will be disenfranchised in the polls.

Insecurity in the south forced the Independent Election Commission (IEC) to briefly delay registering voters in the four provinces where the Taliban insurgency is strongest. So far, the IEC has managed to register just over half a million people in Helmand, Kandahar, Nimroz, and Uruzgan combined, an IEC spokesperson said, or about 1 million fewer people than were registered in those provinces ahead of the presidential vote in 2004.

Further complicating matters, a funding shortfall means that millions of Afghan refugees who live in neighboring Pakistan and Iran will not be registered as they were in the past. That will also affect the Pashtun turnout, because many villagers in insecure southern areas have fled across the border.

Violence has already marred the voter registration process, and many fear there could be wider bloodshed on polling day. Many Afghans, like Haji Kabeer, are frightened to bring their relatives, especially women, to the polling stations.

In the current circumstances, members of my tribe living in the town of Gardez can vote, said Gul Ahmed Ahmedzai, a tribal elder in Paktia province. But not those in the border areas where the security is poor. What is being done to change that?

Others say public hostility toward the Kabul government is an even harder challenge to overcome. Haji Qayyun, a tribal elder in central Logar province, campaigned for Karzai ahead of the 2004 election.

I told people there would be roads and schools and clinics. It was an easy sell, he said. But now people come and complain that five years later, they still have nothing. I am finding it hard to convince my people to vote. Not just for Karzai, for anyone.

Regardless of what happens on Aug. 20, any incoming Afghan government will face extraordinary challenges. The Taliban have grown stronger and widened their zone of influence. Opium smuggling has mushroomed, as has violent crime, including kidnapping. The economy remains unstable, and tensions between Afghanistans ethnic minorities are rising.

Pashtuns make up the largest block of Afghanistans patchwork of ethnic groups. If millions stay home on polling day, either by choice or because they deem it too dangerous to vote, their disenfranchisement could actually contribute to further instability, by fueling perceptions in the south that Pashtuns have been excluded from the political process. Unfortunately, such perceptions could benefit the Taliban, and they certainly wont bolster the view among Afghans that democracy is the best way forward.