Ghazi Amanullah being a patriotic, brave Muslim leader wanted to implement European model to bring peace and success in Afghanistan. However, the unjustified collateral arrest of religious scholars, youths, intellectuals, extra judicial killings of tens of thousands of Afghans, bulldozing living detainees collectively in mass grave yards and the subsequent invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet forces led to the public armed resistance in Afghanistan.
In the aftermath of the Soviet withdrawal and collapse of Dr Najeebullah regime, the devastating civil war, has unluckily spread disappointment among Afghan people and supported the Taliban uprising led to the failure of Afghanistan.
The first emotional attempt to establish a civilized and modern system in our country was initiated by Ghazi Amanullah in the early 20th century. He was a patriotic, brave, and courageous Muslim leader. He wanted the European model to be implemented in Afghanistan under the leadership of intellectual rulers, but unfortunately, his inconsideration regarding the religious and cultural aspects of the literacy level of his people, and the traditionally hostile mentality of the Afghans against British colonialism collectively caused the failure of his attempts. Of course, we have to appreciate his dignity as he left the country before the blood of Afghans was spilled.
In 1978, another new extreme version of so-called eastern civilization(socialism)was initiated by Pro communist elements for the experimental stage to be imposed on Afghans. Those elements had taken over the power through a bloody coup, but suffered severely, due to policies contradicting the Afghan culture and deep religious sentiments ​​of Afghans.
The attempt to impose and implement this theory was bloody, cruel, and accompanied by severe hostile activities, as it provoked strong public resistance against the left-wing parties in Afghanistan.
The unjustified collateral arrest of religious scholars, youths, and intellectuals, extra judicial killings of tens of thousands of Afghans, bulldozing of living detainees collectively in mass graveyards and the subsequent invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet forces led to the public armed resistance in Afghanistan.
Afghanistan during that period of the Cold War became the center of an ideological and geopolitical clash of the theories of communism and capitalism, but sacrifices were offered by the people of Afghanistan. The attempt at social change and the invasion of Afghanistan by Soviet forces were provocative assaults on the religious sentiments and cultural values of the Afghans. The Soviets were suffered huge human and financial losses and finally forced to withdraw their forces from Afghanistan.
In the aftermath of the Soviet withdrawal and collapse of Dr. Najeebullah’s regime, the devastating civil war has unluckily spread disappointment among Afghan people and supported the Taliban uprising, looking at the rebellions as a spiritual rescue force to end the civil war and eliminate corruption. They targeted those who were involved in destruction, murdered innocent people, and committed human rights violations for power.
The Taliban could succeed in taking over almost all of Afghanistan. Their policies and conduct were however based on extremism, but a majority of the Afghans continued to support them for their slogans to eradicate war and restore peace.
Consequently to September 11 attacks, a grand coalitionØŒ formed by the United States invaded Afghanistan and overthrew the Taliban regime. A new version of the 90s warlords, human rights violators, and pro-West liberals took over Afghanistan, following the first Bonn accord, shadowed by NATO combat forces and supported by the international community. A new war started in Afghanistan under a new name and a new slogan. It was called the “War on Terror”.
High levels of corruption, human rights abuses, the brutality of warlords, divided government structures, dual citizenship of officials, arbitrary war tactics of NATO, high civilian casualties, their Indifference towards the religious and cultural values ​​of Afghans, the dictating and oppressive approach of the Presidential Palace, the systematic rigging in the elections and foreign interferences have jointly resulted in humiliated failure of the system. The collapse of the government was due to the combination of several factors, but the US and the Taliban’s failure to reach an agreement was considered to be the main cause.
The subsequent abrupt cut-off in the financial aid by the global community caused a problematic breakthrough in the performance of the commercial banking sector, a massive drop in purchasing power, across the country, and had significant impacts on Afghanistan’s economy.
State’s major institutions have either been dissolved or stopped functioning, civilization is moving downward, and attempts to block moderate reforms are considered state policy. Afghanistan is heading towards turning into a country with a failed government and isolated geography by the international community.
Taking over the power by the Taliban, through the bullet, not ballet, dissolving or paralyzing major national institutions, banning female education, monopolization of power and assigning administrative responsibilities to unexperienced and unskilled people, human rights violation, lack of legitimacy, a breach in commitments and global sanctions collectively caused the ongoing disaster.
We have spent decades in wars and succeeded to defeat the invaders and overthrow their installed and supported regimes, but monopolization of power, neglecting public participation, imposing external agendas, and adopting extreme attitudes have taken us to face the current disastrous situation.
We have neither shone in socialism nor obtained medals in liberal democracy and disappointingly we haven’t still fulfilled the commitment to establish an Islamic system in Afghanistan. Despite lots of resources and potential to grow our economy, We, unfortunately, have a needy nation and a poor country that is dependent on international support.
We got accustomed to adopting extreme behavior and gaining power through bullets, while the civilized nations take power with ballets. Our politicians while discussing disputes usually concentrate on inclusive government and every meeting revolves around the distribution of the state’s privileges, while this old and rotten tradition has been out of date and is rarely applicable in the third world.
We have unfortunately neither succeeded in taking concrete steps towards establishing a mechanism for gaining power nor have victoriously reached an agreement on an inclusive national constitution.
Having all the above-mentioned failures, It is extremely vital to establish a legal mechanism to permanently prevent acquiring power through bullets and to lay the foundation of a truly inclusive, representative, an accountable, transparent, national system based on the will of the people in Afghanistan.
We can not achieve the objectives unless we promote the level of national, academic, and political discussions in compliance with the religious, cultural, and social characteristics of Afghans. If we can’t take this initiative, the coercion of time may force us to change in such a way that our national interests may not be protected. The oppression of time deprives human beings of their ability to innovate, switch the candles off, compels to move towards their destination in dark.
The continuation of the current situation challenges our future. If we avoid reforms and radically block adopting reforms, we will suffer and break. We desperately need such a system through intra-Afghan dialogue to bring peace at home, live in peace with the world and neighbors, avoid monopolization of power, ensure people’s participation, have a constitution, maintain ethnic and cultural diversity, national unity and fulfil our commitment to the territorial integrity of the country.
