Petraeus Sees Afghanistan Progress - www.badc0ded.com

In Afghanistan, The Civil Service 'Surge' That Isn't

As U.S. troops flood into southern Afghanistan, the same can't be said for Afghan government workers. There are critical shortages of government bureaucrats in regions such as Helmand and Kandahar. U.S. military officers are particularly frustrated by the lack of a civilian 'surge.' Marine Gen. Richard Mills commands some 20,000 Marines in Helmand province, a key haven for Taliban fighters. But he says that what he really needs are a few good Afghan bureaucrats. 'It's a difficult thing to do — it's difficult to attract talented civil servants,' Mills said. Next door in Kandahar province, the governor, Tooryalai Wesa, is having the same trouble. 'In some districts, we have only the district governor with the police chief,' he said. 'So if you could at least have an attorney there or a prosecutor or a judge or a finance guy.' U.S. officials say they have filled only about 25 percent of the key government jobs in Kandahar province, and that Helmand isn't much better. It's a serious problem. The insurgency has gained strength because the Afghan government is either corrupt — or not around. Villagers in the south tell NPR that they haven't seen any government officials, sometimes for years. And some senior government officials, like district governors, sometimes don't even live in their districts. It's not like Afghan government workers aren't available. There's a Civil Service Training Institute in Kabul, funded by the U.S. and other countries, that's graduating thousands of would-be bureaucrats. 'Right now, they've reached 11,000,' said Earl Gast, who runs the Afghanistan programs for the U.S. Agency for International Development, which provides economic and humanitarian assistance worldwide. 'And the target is to get to 15,000 or 16,000 trained civil servants before the end of the year.' But Gast pointed out that there's a simple reason why many of them are unwilling to work in Helmand or Kandahar: 'If you work for the government, especially, you've got a target on your back,' he said. Those two provinces have seen the worst of the fighting. A Kandahar district governor was killed by a car bomb this summer, and there has been a surge of assassinations of local government workers in Helmand province. U.S. officials have responded by building dormitories where government workers can live under tight security, and the Afghan government is providing hardship pay to work in the provinces. But officials say recruitment is moving slowly. Security isn't the only issue. The American government is also part of the problem: The U.S. military and the State Department are scooping up the best-educated Afghans to work as translators. One senior officer, who asked not to be named, said the smartest and most educated Afghans he met were all working for the U.S., and that it wasn't exactly a blueprint for the way the government ought to be doing this.'We are competing in some ways with the Afghan government for staff,' said Alex Thier, who is in charge of USAID's Office of Afghanistan and Pakistan Affairs in Washington. 'We do pay more often than the Afghan government civil service salary.'An Afghan government salary can run up to about $2,400 per year, but Afghan translators can make at least $80,000 a year working for the Americans. Thier said the U.S. and its allies are trying to fix the disparity by providing more money to help Afghanistan beef up those government salaries. And he hopes that as security improves, more Afghans will agree to take up civil service posts in Helmand and Kandahar. Private relief organizations, known as NGOs, are also attracting Afghans with better salaries. That's one more sector that people like Wesa have to compete against. 'Because the government cannot afford the salaries the NGOs pay for that, the international NGOs, so that will be a challenge,' Wesa said. But there's another, largely untapped, source of Afghan talent that he and others are trying to attract. 'My recommendation from the very beginning is to bring the former Afghans living overseas,' Wesa said. 'Canada, United States, Europe, Australia — those are full of former, experienced, educated Afghans.' Wesa himself was a college professor in Canada before he returned to his homeland two years ago. He hopes other Afghans will follow his lead, driven by patriotism — rather than a paycheck.

Afghan election threatened by violence, says watchdog

Taliban violence and intimidation are threatening Afghanistan's parliamentary elections as the government fails to protect candidates, especially women, a human rights watchdog said Thursday. Afghanistan is due to go to the polls on September 18, when around 2,500 candidates will contest the 249 seats in the lower house of parliament, the Wolesi Jirga. The Taliban, who have been waging an intensifying insurgency for almost nine years, have said anyone associated with the poll is a target and have so far been blamed for the killing of at least three candidates. Many others working on the elections have been attacked and kidnapped, with women candidates said to be the most vulnerable to intimidation and threats. In a statement condemning the pre-election violence, New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said: 'Candidates -- as well as their staff members and election officials -- face assassinations, kidnappings and intimidation by insurgents as well as by rival candidates. 'Women candidates are facing the highest level of intimidation.' US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton joined calls for the Kabul government to provide adequate security for all participants in the poll, including voters. Rachel Reid, HRW's Afghanistan researcher, was quoted as saying that the Taliban attacks and the 'broad lack of confidence' in the Afghan government's ability to carry out a safe election, 'threatens its validity'. 'Insurgent violence, particularly against women candidates, was inevitable, but the government?s weak response was not,' she said. 'While some candidates have complained to Human Rights Watch about the government?s lack of provisions for protecting candidates, others have not requested help or turned it down, citing a lack of confidence in the Afghan security forces,' HRW said. The Taliban threats and the deteriorating security situation follow last year's presidential poll, which was marred by extensive fraud, most of it found to be in favour of President Hamid Karzai. The Taliban killed and injured hundreds of people leading up to and on election day last year, declaring the election a tool of foreign occupiers, mainly the United States which is leading anti-insurgency efforts. The United States and NATO have 150,000 troops in Afghanistan, some of which will be deployed to help secure polling centres. Afghan election authorities have said that security can be provided for 5,987 polling centres, out of a total of 6,835. Most of those that will remain closed are in Nangahar province, on the eastern border with Pakistan, according to observer Democracy International. The Independent Election Commission (IEC), which oversees the poll, has said the polling stations will remain shut because security cannot be guaranteed. Candidates and their supporters have been bombed, kidnapped, shot and -- in one case in troubled Ghazni province south of Kabul -- beheaded. Last month five people working for candidate Fawzya Gailani in eastern Herat were kidnapped and killed in what remains the most shocking attack on election workers since campaigning began in late June. That attack sent a message to women candidates that 'not just in Herat but in every other province it may not be safe for you to campaign,' said Democracy International's Jed Ober. Most threats reported to the Free and Fair Election Foundation of Afghanistan were against women, HRW said in its statement. It cited 'at least 40 incidents of threatening letters or phone calls in 10 provinces. Many of these incidents include threats of violence if the woman does not withdraw her candidacy,' it said.

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