Afghanistan averts a crisis, but lurches towards another

Sajjad Ashraf says the idea of introducing a national unity government in Kabul allows each party to claim a victory of sorts, but it is unlikely to bring peace

Afghan presidential election rivals Ashraf Ghani and Abdullah Abdullah. Jawad Jalali / EPA

Afghanistan has averted a crisis, for now at least, after John Kerry, the US secretary of state, announced an agreement between the two presidential candidates that all 8.1 million votes cast in the run-off election will be audited under international monitors.

With Ashraf Ghani and Abdullah Abdullah flanking him, Mr Kerry announced that a national unity government will be installed after the audit is concluded.

Given the enormity of the task, it is certain that the inauguration of the next Afghan president, previously set for August 2, will be delayed. The Afghan Independent Election Commission had earlier announced preliminary results putting Mr Ghani ahead with 56.44 per cent of the vote and Mr Abdullah, who led comfortably in the first round, trailing on 43.6 per cent.

Both candidates cried fraud but Mr Abdullah feels particularly cheated after alleged election fraud appeared to deny him victory in the previous presidential election in 2009. Unconfirmed reports from that time suggested that he was promised the presidency this time around.

This time he has raised the spectre of civil war by threatening to set up a parallel administration. An implausibly high voter turnout – a million more than in the first round – supports Mr Abdullah’s allegations of foul play. Gridlock between the two camps has set the stage for a dangerous collision course between various ethnic groups in what is a deeply fractured country – a point underscored by yesterday’s car bomb attack in eastern Afghanistan, which killed at least 89 people.

Little distinguishes the two candidates from each other. Both are the products of American military intervention in Afghanistan and have been two of its principal beneficiaries. They have both served as ministers under Hamid Karzai. And more importantly for the US, they have both vowed to sign the Bilateral Security Agreement – the bedrock of continued US presence in Afghanistan.

The winner is expected to lead the country at a time when the US forces are largely withdrawing and Afghanistan grapples with reduced international aid and interest. A disputed election jeopardises any form of smooth transition. The US, meanwhile, very much hopes that a peaceful transfer of power would demonstrate that its intervention in Afghanistan has not been in vain.

Allegations of ballot rigging in a country with no tradition of democracy are almost to be expected, especially so in Afghanistan, which has endured a prolonged period of turbulence. It is the system of announcing interim results, however, that encourages allegations of foul play and yet also makes it hard for interim results to be overturned once they have been published.

The idea of introducing a national unity government after the completion of a vote audit allows each party to claim a victory of sorts. Yet it is unlikely to bring peace. Such an approach was adopted during the 1990s following the ousting of president Mohammed Najibullah. The ensuing chaos led to the rise of Taliban.

But the audit is a satisfactory outcome when the stated US goals of ensuring transparency and electoral legitimacy are taken into account.

However, details of how the audit will run have yet to made public. The finer details of the proposed national unity government are also missing. Even if they had been agreed, a unity government will be a hard act to pull off. Previous experience of such arrangements elsewhere in the world indicate that it is likely to unravel amid deep mistrust between the protagonists.

All the indicators suggest that Afghanistan will continue to face testing times and the likely outcome is that it will remain a playground for various external interests for many years to come.

A troubled Afghanistan, with little economic opportunity for common people, may yet also become a powerful recruiting ground for jihadis, intent on fighting both internally and in the wider region.

Sajjad Ashraf is an adjunct professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore and an associate fellow at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore. He was a member of Pakistan’s foreign service for 35 years