Without a Working Government, Kabul Residents Worry About Future
Afghans will choose the style of their future government, Taliban says
[Islamabad} With the Taliban firmly in charge of Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul, as the US-led withdrawal nears completion, and after former president Ashraf Ghani fled the country, the majority of Afghans are agonizing over their country’s future.
Most public service institutions, banks and other financial institutions have remained closed for nearly three weeks, since the Taliban takeover of the capital.
Hundreds of troubled citizens along with scores of government employees held a protest outside the New Kabul Bank on Saturday.
“Government employees have not been paid for the last three months,” Saif ud Din, a Kabul-based official from the Ministry of Education, told The Media Line.
Since the swift downfall of the Afghan government on August 15, no new administration has been formed and analysts warn of the perils of a power vacuum in the country.
Even though the Taliban have taken control of the capital without any bloodshed, public panic, frustration and anxiety have been exacerbated by the lack of a government.
Uncertainty is fueling concerns among Afghans about what life will be like under the new Taliban regime.
Dr. Deen Muhammad, a Kabul-based hospital employee, told The Media Line that “after the Kabul Airport suicide attack, the absence of female nursing staff in hospitals was felt with great intensity and there were troubles in treating the injured women.”
“We are facing complications in caring for pregnant women,” he added.
“Hopefully things will get better in the coming days; actually, the young female staff is terrified, and they have been intimidated by the stories of the Taliban in the previous era,” Muhammad said.
Zabiullah Mujahid, the Taliban’s spokesperson, told The Media Line that, “we have already advised female employees of the health department to resume their duties as soon as possible.”
Last week, Mujahid in a news conference had told working Afghan women to stay home, saying that the Taliban fighters had not yet been trained to treat them respectfully and to not hurt them.
Mujahid also told The Media Line that the Taliban is in the final stages of consultations on the formation of a federal government and cabinet. “Meanwhile, to maintain the law-and-order situation, we have already appointed governors and police chiefs … in 33 provinces,” Mujahid added.
“It’s up to the Afghan people to decide what kind of (governmental) system should be here in Afghanistan, no one else needs to worry,” Mujahid said.
There is nothing but fear and despondency in Afghanistan
Kamal Alam, a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center and a senior adviser to the Massoud Foundation, told The Media Line that “in Kabul, at least every second Afghan wants to run away from the country and the reason is simply that no one is going to trust the Taliban.”
“This action in itself speaks louder than words. The desperate fall from the US Air Force plane of a promising Afghan footballer sums it up,” he said, referring to Zaki Anwari, 17, a member of Afghanistan’s national youth soccer team, who fell to his death after hanging on to the wheel of a military plane as it took off from the airport in Kabul, in an attempt to be evacuated from the country.
“There is nothing but fear and despondency in Afghanistan,” Alam said.
“Will how the Taliban run government matter? Do they have qualified bureaucracy? The hasty flight of Ghani and his accomplices along with significant amounts of cash means every Afghan hates them, but daily life, personal liberty and security are now at stake,” Alam added.
The Taliban have promised that they will not take revenge on citizens for working with the United States and its allies, but there are fears among the majority of the people that the Taliban will invalidate women’s rights and other gains that women have achieved in the last 20 years.
A female nurse, Freshta, who served in a government hospital in Kabul before the Taliban takeover on August 15, told The Media Line that “the female workers are very anxious about their future; we are scattered and have locked down in homes. Whenever there is a knock on the door, we get scared,” she said.
Najaf, a professor in Kabul’s privately owned university who asked that his real name not be used, told The Media Line that: “Due to the absence of proper governance, the situation in Afghanistan is not satisfactory and there is a dire need to restore the institutions that serve the public.”
“Almost every working family, particularly in the capital, is living in a state of psychosomatic confusion about the future,” he added.
Najaf also told The Media Line that “the whole country is grappling with the rumors about human rights violations by the Taliban fighters.” He added that the rumors are “untrue,” but for those who are already living in a “terrifying moment,” it is natural for people who hear such news to be afraid.
Sharing his personal experience, Najaf told The Media Line that, “my wife is a teacher in a government school, and after the Taliban took over, she wears a hijab,” a veil worn by Muslim women which usually covers the hair, head and chest.
“I walk to school every day to drop her off. Armed Taliban patrols are on the road, we are afraid to see them. But it never happened that they asked us any question or even looked at us,” he also said.
Zareen Khan, a Kabul-based cloth merchant, told The Media Line that: “Businesses are open. Residents are routinely moving through the streets, though fewer in number; women are also seen in the markets.”
“Unfortunately, a girl’s high school in this area of the city is still closed. Though the Taliban has imposed no ban on girls’ education, due to the uncertain atmosphere the students and staff are staying at home,” Khan added.
Najeeb Ullah, a trader and a resident of a Shahr-e Naw, the capital’s economic hub, told The Media Line that “we are facing difficulties in withdrawing money from the banks, even the country’s central bank is closed. Our ATM cards are unusable.”
“I am running out of cash, I have to buy groceries to run our kitchen, but there is no money in the machine; however, the bank officials have assured us that the money would arrive soon,” he added.
We are facing difficulties in withdrawing money from the banks, even the country’s central bank is closed. Our ATM cards are unusable.
Abdul Rehman Haqqani, a Jalalabad-based local reporter, told The Media Line that: “If you look at the present-day situation in the city, you will realize that life has returned to normal, but there has been an excessive rise in the prices of daily necessities, which is leaving an impact on people’s lives.”
A few residents of Jalalabad city also told The Media Line that the law-and-order situation is under control, but most of them seemed worried about the future.
Some analysts across the globe hold the Biden administration responsible for the current anarchy in Afghanistan, which took the lives not only of 13 US Marines, but of scores of innocent Afghan civilians, who lost their lives while trying to flee the country just to secure their future.
Dr. Frank Musmar, a Texas-based non-resident researcher at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies (BESA), placed the blame for Afghanistan’s deteriorating situation on the “reckless” withdrawal by the United States.
“In February 2020 when the Trump administration inked a conditional peace agreement with the Taliban, the US officials who negotiated the agreement suggested that al-Qaida and other terrorists continued presence in Afghanistan would violate the accord with the Taliban,” he told The Medial Line.
“The Biden administration’s application of the agreement was a disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan in a humiliating foreign policy, unlike anything our country has endured since the Iran hostage crisis,” he said.
Musmar said that “Biden confidently proclaimed in July that the likelihood of the Taliban overrunning everything and owning Afghanistan is highly unlikely; however, one month later, the Taliban becomes a horrifying reality.” He added that “the Taliban fighters have seized scores of American military vehicles and artillery along with the state-of-the-art battlefield equipment.”
Musmar told The Media Line that “the world has watched panicked civilians clinging to US military aircraft in a desperate attempt to escape the chaos unleashed by Biden’s reckless retreat, including American diplomats begging the Taliban not to attack the embassy.”
“Even the man on the street in America agrees that the withdrawal was reckless. The Biden administration should evacuate all personnel before withdrawing any soldiers,” he said.
Even the man on the street in America agrees that the withdrawal was reckless
Muhammad Athar Javed is a fellow with New America’s International Security program in Washington, DC and the director general of Pakistan House, an Islamabad-based think tank.
He told The Media Line that “the risk that Afghanistan may slide into chaos and violence is higher because the Taliban and allies are taking too long to establish a centralized government, although some ministerial posts and governors are nominated.”
“The Taliban must establish an all-inclusive government with political representation from across ethnic and linguistic lines,” Javed added.
He also told The Media Line that, “the threat of ISIS is not the only threat that may bring the Taliban and the US (together). Ostensibly, during the past year, the Taliban and the US reached an understanding to neutralize ISIS. What may constitute cooperation between Taliban and the US may include more than that.”
Javed added that the Taliban has a “desire and willingness” to adopt a diplomatic approach to resolving security issues and the transition of the government. “Therefore, it is plausible to argue that Taliban and the US cooperation against ISIS will indeed help to stabilize Afghanistan and beyond,” he said.
