Described by the UN special envoy to Afghanistan, Kai Eide, as the ‘most complicated,’ the 2009 Afghan presidential and provincial elections, set for August 20, are going to make history in many ways.

 During the first presidential election, held in September 2004, the people had commonly developed a hope that the coming four years will have a huge contribution to their country and the next time they will cast their votes in peace and prosperity. But they are now seeing the opposite, unfortunately.

 Besides a surge in attacks countrywide, the Taliban militants vowed on July 30th that they will try their best to prevent voters from going to polling stations to cast their votes. They have already killed many campaigners and have attacked many campaign offices in different provinces.

 On the other hand, among 41 in total, there are only two female presidential candidates this time (In the 2004 presidential election, there was 1 female among 18 total candidates). They are even not able to put their campaign posters freely on public places let alone asking people for votes. The female candidates for provincial seats have been campaigning in burqas, not because they are so fond of wearing the garment, but they have been facing opposition and are under constant threats from people around them. Some times their families also get targeted by the anti-election and anti-women elements so they use every means to hide their identity and go to the campaign meetings where only women are present. And that too after getting permission from their male relatives.

 The UN special envoy also said that around 3000 donkeys were deployed to carry the ballots to the remote areas in the provinces. This means that the areas where the donkeys have to carry the ballots do not have any roads (‘road’ here does not necessarily mean an asphalted and properly constructed road, but can be a pathway on which a vehicle just can draw itself. We have hundreds of this kind of pathways, in Afghanistan, even in the capital, Kabul, which are generally called ‘roads.’ But the areas mentioned do not have even these roads why the UN had to hire 3000 donkeys).

 Question: would the people to whom the donkeys are carrying the ballots have any idea what to do with them? Would they be aware of the election campaign, the candidates, the issues and challenges that the country has been facing and the candidates’ policies on them? Let’s hope the donkeys do not return from the villages and write down this interesting history.

 Fresh news: another rival candidate, Baz Mohammad Kofi, announced his withdrawal from the race in favor of the incumbent Hamid Karzai. What does this mean? He is the winner again!

 Both the commanding powers of the eight-year old War on Terror, the United States and the United Kingdom, recently hinted for talks with the Taliban insurgents after the second presidential election of the country, set for August 20.

 According to Daily Mail, “the suggestion of ‘talks with the Taliban’ came as Gordon Brown revealed the biggest offensive by UK troops in Helmand Province since the conflict began is now over. Ministers said that talking with the insurgents who have killed 191 British soldiers might be the only way to curtail the bloody war.”

 Afghan President Hamid Karzai welcomed and praised this approach, saying: “starting peace process with the Taliban will ensure peace and stability and such efforts are part of our government’s strategy,” said a statement issued from his spokesman’s office on Tuesday, July 28, 2009.

 Like the Britons, the Americans too seem in need of talks with the Taliban as their soldiers suffered record casualties in the month of July. According to Pajhwok Afghan News, while talking to Afghanistan Ulema Council (AUC) in Kabul on July 25, “US special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke promised beginning peace talks with the Taliban and other opposition forces once the upcoming presidential and provincial elections are completed.”

 But the basic question is still unanswered, even not discussed: How are you going to talk with them? Have you developed any strategy for this? The insurgents have always refused to participate in talks and meetings that suggest reconciliation. Withdrawal of the international troops from Afghanistan is their first and foremost demand. For the international troops it is unlikely to accept this demand because it will be their defeat in this bloody war. It is as clear as crystal: the world’s most advanced armies and their governments just can’t afford to be defeated by a force of insurgents.

 For President Hamid Karzai, talks with the Taliban has always been a brilliant idea; but all of his negotiations offers were rejected by the Taliban leadership; the one-eyed insurgent leader has even called on the people to boycott the ‘deceptive election.’ Yet, Mr. Karzai has been using the talks offer as a slogan for his election campaign. During his last visit to Kanahar, he said that he will initiate peace talks with the Taliban if he was re-elected.  But why could not he do so during his eight years in the office? The answer is simple: because the Taliban wanted a complete withdrawal of the international troops and the international troops had an agenda of curbing the menace of terrorism.

 The idea of ‘moderate Taliban’ and reconciliation with them is also a blur perception: if someone is a moderate, they surely would not like to be a part of the ruthlessness that the insurgents have been demonstrating in different forms such as killing civilian people in suicide attacks, burning schools and hospitals and murdering aid workers, engineers, journalists, teachers and doctors. After reading this Newsweek article, one may consider even Mullah Baradar a ‘moderate,’ but, according to the article, it was he who re-organized the force in true meaning and still leads it from unknown places in Quetta.

 And then there is another question: if the international troops and the next Afghan government decide to talk with the insurgents, which group of the insurgents will they talk with? And does each of these groups has enough authority to come to the table of talks? When Pakistan balked at the recent Helmand operation, it was not just that the militants were fleeing to their land, but the real reason was Pakistan’s losing of its strategic assets.  It means that there are many external factors, such as Pakistan, who should be addressed before any talks with the Afghan forces of the insurgents. If the external factors were not addressed and the insurgents were brought to the table of talks, it will be just a waste of time and resources because these insurgents will get the huge share of the benefits of reconciliation while the external forces will still be free to recruit and train other fighters or groups of fighters who will then confront the international forces with a new strategy and different tactics of fighting to achieve their goals.

 The presidential election is now three weeks away. It is premature to say anything about the approaches of the would-be-president of Afghanistan to this issue, but after reading the views of most hopeful candidate, Dr. Ashraf Ghani, one can conclude that the talks option will not work unless the external factors are addressed. He states: “There are four major threats to securing Afghanistan’s futures. First, Al Qaeda is a renewed force moving fluidly between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Second, an expanded, well resourced, and multifaceted insurgency presents a continual threat to Afghan and international actors.” And for addressing these challenges, he writes: “To succeed, we and our friends and allies must reverse the Taliban’s gains and promote a more capable and accountable Afghan government.”

 The Pakistani government in the restive northwest province on Sunday arrested Maulana Sufi Mohammad, father-in-law of Mullah Fazlullah, the militant leader in Swat, and head of Tanzim-e-Nifaz-e-Sharia-e-Mohammadi (TNSM).

 “He killed a lot of people. Again he was planning for this. We will not allow anyone to destroy peace at Malakand and Swat,” said Mian Iftekhar Hussain, Information Minister of the province, as quoted by AFP.

 Interestingly, Mr. Hussain is a part of the same government which freed the Maulana in February 2008 and allowed him to go home comfortably. He then brokered a peace deal between his son-in-law and the government. The government then did not consider the fact that he had ‘killed a lot of people.’ How a peace deal can work when it is brokered by a killer? The government ignored this question, the Swat peace deal did never work, and it had to arrest him again.

 It is not just one example of the game that the government of Pakistan, its army and its secret agencies have been playing in the region: it places the blame of the assassination of the country’s most popular leader and two-time Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto, on Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud and wants to kill or capture him, yet it failed to provide protection to a tribal commander, Qari Zainuddin, who rebelled against his network. Similarly, the government is fighting against the militants in many parts of the tribal and settled areas, yet it failed to support the tribal lashkars (armies) that wanted to wipe out the militants from their areas. This is enough evidence of the actual fact: Pakistan wants neither to win nor lose this game.

 As most of the Pakistanis thought the militants as their ‘strategic assets’ because their government was fully supporting them in their campaign against Afghanistan, their uprising against the Pakistani government and people has still not changed the minds and interests of some powerful elements within the government and the army. These elements are the key stakeholders of the power and they want to continue the war against terrorism in just a confusing and complicated way in order to keep both the international community and the insurgents engaged in the region. These elements need the international community for huge aids and the insurgents to use against India. The result: they can neither win nor lose this war.

 Child labor is one of the troubling core problems of the South Asian countries, particularly Afghanistan and Pakistan, where a cold-blooded insurgency has paralyzed the already weak system. The insurgents, who fight in the name of religion, have undoubtedly proved their strength in waging wars, but they have, unfortunately, never worked for or talked about problems like child labor and violence against women.

 In the first photo, taken in Peshawar in March 2009, two school-age children work hard to earn bread for their families. In the same time, social and political developments and changes have brought a new hope to some of the war-hit people. In the second photo, two children joyfully browse the contents of their laptop computers distributed to them by One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project, in Isteqlal High School, Jalalabad, Afghanistan. (Photos by Abdulhadi Hairan)

By Abdulhadi Hairan

 Some people think that Pashto is a very complicated and hard-to-learn language. The reason behind this perception is a lack of knowledge and inaccessibility to the resources of this ancient yet living and interesting language.

 Similarly, translating from one language into another is a hard job if taken seriously, but in the case of translating into Pashto, it is harder and arduous to translate close to the original meaning. It does not mean that the language is complicated, but unfortunately saying, most of the translators spend their whole life on learning and improving the source language (e.g. English, Arabci, Urdu, Persian, etc.) while ignoring the target language (Pashto). They believe, of course wrongly, that if they are born Pashtuns, and their mother tongue is Pashto (Pashtu) that is enough for their skills to write in (or speak) this language.

 As a result, they may be able to write good, even excellent, English, but their Pashto writing is always full of very common mistakes such as typing in non-standard script, word by word translation of expressions and proverbs and writing in an incomprehensible sentence structure. This leads to a complete ruin of the project because the audience will get confused or will just laugh at what the translation presents. Sometimes deadly incidents happen if the misunderstanding occurs during interpretation between two hostiles or in a war-like situation.

 Working in this field for last ten years, I have many first-hand funny accounts of these mistakes. Once when I worked with a local Pashto newspaper, just the use of an incorrect ya (ى) in a news story resulted in the newspaper’s mockery by its readers, writers, and opponents. The story was about the arresting of an Afghan journalist by the administration of Pakistan’s lawless tribal areas. The reporter, who was not a good Pashto writer, faxed the report which just by chance went to a new editor. We have five yas (ى) in Pashto. One of these is ې which is used for females. He used this ya for the arrested journalist, who was a tribal man and wore a whole bunch of beard.

 Looking at the ya, the editor thought the journalist was female. So he used this ya in the whole story and made him a woman. In the morning when the paper was published, the arrested journalist was a woman in the story and a man in his photo, printed side by side with the story (this editor usually did not check the photos; the paper had a separate photo editor who usually did not check the stories).

 This kind of mistakes happen when expressions and proverbs are translated word by word, or ي is used where should be ې, or ۍ instead of ئ, and so on.

For a quality and successful translation, it is necessary that the translator understands and is able to write and translate both the source and target languages with equal good command. They should have full knowledge about both the cultures and traditions to which the source and target language belongs.

 To avoid the mistakes and unwanted results, translators should spend as much time in learning and improving their own language as they do in learning and improving the source language. Experience and scientific studies show that having a good command in their own language will also help them in improving the source languages.

 The horrendous increase of insurgent attacks across Afghanistan ahead of the upcoming presidential election says what it has behind it: the security situation will deteriorate further which means that the polling will be completed without the international observers watching. This makes it clear that if there is no security, the voting process will not be free and transparent.

 Understandably we can hope that everything will be fine. But concerns have been widely expressed about some government officials’ illegal involvement in campaign activities for certain candidates which will lead the polling to be massively rigged and results manipulated.

 It is sure that neither the international community nor the Afghan people can afford such a situation because, if there was rigging on a massive scale or the results were manipulated, a reaction similar to the aftermath of the Iranian election will come up. Thus, uprisings and countrywide protests will add up to the prevailing tension and this is very likely to paralyze the whole system.

 The idea of deploying more international and Afghan troops on the Election Day is very important in this context because insecurity will result in rigging and rigging will lead the country into chaos. Consequently, the failure and chaos will gravely undermine all the efforts the international community has so far done to stabilize the country and its government.

 So it is very necessary that the international community, particularly the United Nations, take immediate steps and make sound decisions before things reach the irreversible level.

After many efforts by the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), the government of Pakistan eventually announced to extend the stay of Afghan refugees for more three years in the country that itself faces a flow of IDPs due to the rising militancy and a war-like situation.

Najmuddin Khan, the Pakistani Minister for Refugees’ Affairs, made this announcement in Islamabad on Thursday and said the deadline that was going to expire by the end of this year will now be extended until 2012; the security situation in Afghanistan would have been hopefully improved by then.

 The government had issued the registered Afghans in Pakistan refugee status cards valid until the end of 2009. According to news reports, the Minister said the decision will be announced formally after an upcoming tripartite meeting of Pakistan, Afghanistan, and the UNHCR, in Kabul.

 Though many people expected this decision, yet it was the cause of immense satisfaction for those who did not want to return to Afghanistan right now – some because of the deteriorating security situation and some due to personal reasons.

 Besides this good decision, which was a legitimate right of the Afghan refugees living in the country for almost two decades, we demand the government of Pakistan to order its police not to treat the helpless Afghan refugees in uncivilized way. Several reports suggest that the police have been beating and humiliating the Afghans just because they are Afghan refugees. That is the worst impression of Pakistani state that the returning Afghans carry with them.

 Born as Sahibzada Habib-ur-Rehman and known as Qalandar Momand, this genius Pashtun writer, poet, critic, linguist, research scholar, play-writer, journalist, lexicographer, academician, the founder chairman of Peshawar Press Club, and great Pashtun died on Feb. 04, 2003, in Peshawar. The sad news of his demise reached us through an Urdu newspaper in Karachi which was profoundly felt in the literary circles, activities and discussions in every part of the world where Pashtuns resided.

 He was born, according to his matriculation certificate, on September 01, 1930, and grew up in an era of great political activism and resistance against the British Raj as well as the revival of Pashtun nationalism. Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan aka Bacha Khan, well-known as Fakhr-e-Afghan (Pride of the Afghans), had been making tireless efforts to educate his people through a reformist mission and later uniting them under The Servants of God Movement, popularly known as Khudai Khidmatgar Tehrik.

 According to the above information, he was 17 when the British Empire left the Indian subcontinent breaking it into two parts, India and Pakistan, in 1947. After the two new countries came into existence, the two other leaders of the subcontinent, Gandhi and Jinnah, enjoyed leading their nations into a new path, while Bacha Khan was destined to continue his struggle, now against the Pakistani rulers. Though most of the Pashtuns were muslims, Pakistan never treated them as its citizens despite the fact that the country was created under the name of Islam. Thus, Bacha Khan had to start a new non-violent struggle for his people’s rights within Pakistan for which he was put into prison for the rest of his life, and the new oppressors not only aggressively massacred and looted his people, but also tried in a shameless way to rob them of their beloved language, Pashto or Pashtu.

 The young Qalandar was a witness to all of this. He was a big fan, and later a close aide, of Bacha Khan. The Fakhr-e-Afghan has mentioned him in his autobiography, Zama Zhond aw Jeddojehad (My Life and Struggle). He was a poet by nature, and, according to his teachers at Islamia College of Peshawar, had a special flair for literary and research pursuits from his early age. He belonged to a well-known family of poets, writers, and intellectual persons, and had the company of other eminent Pashto poets and writes of his time such as Amir Hamza Shinwari, Ghani Khan, Ajmal Khattak, Mia Taqweemul Haq Kakakhel, Dost Mohammad Khan Kamil Momand, and others.

 From his early student life, he was a political activist, a poetry gatherings organizer, a social worker, an intellectual writer, a revolutionary figure, and a distinguished and well-respected personality among his friends and the literary circles. After getting his Master of Arts in English literature and LLB degrees from the University of Peshawar with distinction, he started his practical life as an employee in the Agriculture Department but then left this job and joined a private construction company.

 A nationalist to the backbone, and an iconoclast of the established literary traditions, Qalandar Momand soon became a central figure among the political and literary circles across Pakistan. As a writer and journalist, during his career as editor with many English, Urdu and Pashto newspapers and magazines, he openly criticized the then government’s policies and opposed the dictatorship of Ayub Khan; as a political activist, he actively took part in every effort that led people to stand against the oppressors and their policies; as a literary critic, he was the most active member of the historical Wolasi Adabi Jirga (The People’s Literary Association), which held weekly meetings and discussed literary trends; and as a researcher, his works and studies opened ways to new discussions that proved to be very useful for the Pashto literature on the whole.

 As always happens, his achievements and popularity earned him several good friends and scores of enemies. His political stand and commitment, and literary ideas made his life difficult and miserable, but he never compromised on them. He was put in prison and tortured for his political views by the regime of the time. In one of his poems, he said:

 ‘Che pa Khoshal pa Ranthambor ke washwe

Hagha kane pa maa Lahore ke washwe.’

(The brutality that Khushal Khan Khattak (1613-1689) had endured in Ranthambor (in India, in the hand of Mughal emperor Aurangzeb Alamgir (1658-1707), I had to face it in Lahore).

 According to accounts told by the political prisoners of the time after they were released, they were tortured in such a violent way that many of the helpless prisoners died there. A painful and detailed, and vividly told, account of those tortures can be read in a book named Da Za Pagal Wom? (Was I Mad?), written by renowned nationalist politician and progressive writer Ajmal Khattak.

 Gajrey (Anklets) (published in 1957) was his first and only collection of short stories and the first major work that was widely admired and believed to be the first work of fiction written in accordance with all the standards of the modern short story. This book received an enthusiastic welcome from the Pashto fiction lovers and critics and inspired many young short story writers. In 1976 was published his first collection of poems, Sabawoon (The Dawn), while he was still behind the bars. The poetry of this book brought him to stand side by side with the three most celebrated modern Pashto poets: Amir Hamza Shinwari, Ghani Khan, and Ajmal Khattak.

 Pata Khazana Pil Meezan (The Hidden Treasure in the Balance) (published in 1988) was another of his major works which provoked an endless and sometimes unpleasant discussion about a famous Pashto anthology of ancient works named Pata Khazana (The Hidden Treasure). In his critical work, Qalandar Momand has thoroughly analyzed the content, the background information, the language, the terms, the dates, etc. of the Pata Khazana and concluded that the book was not written or compiled in 1729 by Shah Hussain Hotak in Kandahar as claimed by its discoverer Abdul Hay Habibi, but was fabricated by Habibi himself. Before him, renowned Iranologists Lucia Serena Loi and David Neil MacKenzie, and few Iranian scholars had questioned the genuineness of the manuscript (the original manuscript is not available to the public and nobody knows about its whereabouts), but he was the first notable Pashtun scholar who, by asking undeniable questions and declaring it a forgery, totally rejected the book, thus causing a great controversy. At least ten books and hundreds of articles have been so far written in favor and against Qalandar Momand in this discussion.

 His other works include: (1) A Critical Study of Khairul Bayan; (2) Nazmiyat (poems); (3) Translation of the Chapter on Criticism from Introduction to the Study of English Literature by William Henry Hudson (1922-1968); (4) Daryab (Pashto dictionary); (5) Da Rahman Baba Kuliyat (compilation of all the poems of the mystic poet Rahman Baba); (6) Da Muhammadi Sahibzada Diwan (compilation of all the poems of Pashto poet Muhammadi Sahibzada); (7) Critical Study of Two Books of Munshi Ahmad Jan: Hagha Dagha (This and That) and Da Qissa Khwani Gup (Gossip of Qissa Khwani); (8) Translation of Macbeth by William Shakespeare; (9) Rannayee (The Light) (second collection of poems, published posthumously); (10) Meezan (The Balance) (an anthology of articles, published posthumously); and many more.

 At least six books have been so far written about the life and works of Qalandar Momand, including a PhD. thesis by Dr. Zubair Hasrat from the University of Peshawar. Many renowned contemporary writers and poets of the Pashto and Urdu languages have praised his genius and contributions. Ghani Khan has written a very moving poem to him which is included in Latoon (The Search, collection of poems). Ayaz Daudzai has described him as a man of high caliber; a scholar of Pashto, Urdu, English, Persian, Arabic, Hindi, Hindko, and other languages; and a man from whom you could learn any thing.

 Qalandar Momand was Ahmadi (follower of Mirza Ghulam Ahmad Qadiyani) by faith. According to his close friends, he had never discussed his religious beliefs with any of his literary friends or followers. Because he was a learned scholar, an articulate speaker, a literary genius, had an impressive personality and was firm in his ideas, no one was able to defeat him on the ground of knowledge. Yet, his religious thoughts proved to be his Achilles’ heel. On the one side he was born Ahmadi in a society where people, particularly Ahmadis, could be just killed for their religious thoughts, on the other side, he was a man of undefeatable knowledge and unwavering firmness.

 Consequently, when his opponents failed to defeat him on the ground of knowledge, they attacked his religious beliefs in a very shameless manner. A man from the Rahman Baba Mausoleum printed a fatwa-type booklet in which he and his friends and followers were declared to be ‘infidels’ (Qalandar loved Rahman Baba and had written several in-depth research studies about his life and works). Still, when they were not able to budge him an inch from his political and literary stand, they called him Iranian agent and, by saying that he was receiving funds from Iran, tried to defame his character.

 The charlatan bigots continued to use these deplorable tactics even after his death. Immediately after his demise, The Pashto Academy of The University of Peshawar and the prestigious Pashto Adabi Board announced that they will dedicate next issues of their quarterly magazines, ‘Pashto’ and ‘Tatara’ respectively, to the life and works of Qalandar Momand and will publish them as the Special Issues. The religious bigots, supported by the then Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (a religious alliance) government in the province, threatened the Academy and the Board of untoward consequences if the Issues were ever published. As a result, both the institutions tacitly backed away from their decision and the issues got never published.

 Qalandar Momand will be long remembered for his global thinking for peace, political activism, thought-provoking criticisms, literary works, poetry and short stories. To train young writers and researchers, he had established Da Sahu Likonkyo Maraka (Forum for Active Writers) in 1962, which still holds its weekly meetings on a regular basis in Peshawar. This Forum has trained many people who are now well-known in the world of Pashto literature.

 He served his people and contributed to Pashto literature till his last breath, fulfilling his promise:

 ‘Gulistan ka me pa weeno taza kegi

Har azghai de ham zama pa zrah ke mat shi.’

(If my blood is of any good to keep the garden of love and peace blooming, I invite every thorn to prick into my heart.)

By Abdulhadi Hairan

As Pashtuns form majority of the Afghans, candidates in the upcoming presidential election have been trying to attract as much Pashtun votes as possible because only these votes can help them to ascend the throne of Kabul as did Hamid Karzai, a Pashtun from Kandahar, in 2004.

 Tribal and ethnic relationships have always played a vital role in Afghan politics. A joke circulated here when Barack Obama visited Afghanistan during his election campaign that Gul Agha Sherzai, the governor of eastern Nangrahar province, told people that he (Barack Obama) was a Barakzai (member of the Barakzai Pashtun tribe). This was apparently an attempt to establish some relationship between the Pashtuns and the would-be American president to lessen the tension some people felt during his visit.

 Establishing ethnic and religious relationships of this kind sometimes really work. An example could be former Pakistani dictator Ziaulhaq who was fond of proving everything he did through verses from the Quran. According to insiders, once when he was going to address his nation on an Independence Day, he asked his mullah to find a verse in the Quran through which he could legitimize his dictatorship in Pakistan. By exploiting religion in this way, he ruled the country for 11 years.

 The Afghan presidential candidates are no exception. President Hamid Karzai has acquired the support of Sebghatullah Mujaddedi, a religious and jihadi leader and influential figure. His statement that God has ordered him to vote for Karzai indicates the same ‘relationship.’ Elsewhere, Dr. Abdullah’s campaigners have been trying to prove that he was born a Pashtun. The same goes with other candidates.

 However, these ‘relationships’ have attracted much criticism from Pashto websites, an independent source that give voice to individuals in a society still ruled by ruthless militants, merciless warlords, arrogant murderers, and shameless abusers of human rights.

 Many of the writers of these websites are anonymous, but they write well and hit the point. One such article on www.taand.com points out that the people who campaign for President Hamid Karzai and Dr. Abdullah in the eastern Nangrahar province are known criminals and people feel being harassed as they roam the streets.

 Another article on www.benawa.com advises President Hamid Karzai to be aware of his sycophant campaigners who are ruining his campaign and defaming his character, yet another article on the same website severely criticizes Dr. Abdullah’s campaigners for their attempts of proving him a Pashtun in bid to gain Pashtun votes.

 At the same time, www.tolafghan.com, a well-read Pashto website, has posted a news item saying that, for the first time in Afghan politics, the three hopeful candidates President Hamid Karzai, Dr. Ashraf Ghani, and Dr. Abdullah will have a debate on Thursday which will be aired live on TV and radio channels of the country. The website has invited its readers to watch the ‘interesting debate.’ People are waiting impatiently to watch the three ‘fighting.’

By Abdulhadi Hairan

 The race for the second-ever presidential election in Afghanistan has reached the highest point as the Election Day, August 20 (29 Asad 1388), approaches closer, with candidates trying to use every possible means to muster voters to their camps by promising many improvements, including a change in the current policies.

 Having realized the importance of using the internet technology and online resources in the campaign process, and impressed by its considerable effectiveness in the last American election, leading Afghan candidates, such as Dr. Abdullah, Dr. Ashraf Ghani, and Mirwais Yasini have, for the first time, launched websites for their election campaigns and their campaigners have been using social networks, such as facebook, youtube, twitter, and different blogs providing services, to regularly provide updated information and stay connected with the voters in and out of the country. These online resources have proved to be helpful to raise donations too. According to a post on techpresident.com,

 So [Ashraf] Ghani has spotted an opportunity to use the web in two ways: utilize word-of-mouth and encourage local influencers to spread the word in their communities; and to target the large Afghan ex-pat population in the West for political donations and to amplify their views back into their homeland.

 A total of 41 candidates, among whom two are female, are in the field for the race while more than 15 million voters have been registered in all 34 provinces to choose a new leader for the country which is facing an appallingly growing insurgency, the big obstacle in the successful election process as well as the country’s development and reconstruction efforts.

 Hopefully, despite the deteriorating security situation in southern and southeastern provinces and recent attacks on election campaigners (On July 15, unknown gunmen killed Haji Abdul Sattar, the campaigner for Dr. Abdullah, in Kapisa’s Nijrab district and a grenade attack took place on Hamid Karzai’s election campaign center for women in the southern Zabul province), rallies and gatherings are being held in provinces in which large numbers of supporters voice support for the contenders of their choice and convey to their countrymen a message of their concern for their country’s future.

 Unlike the 2004 presidential campaign, in which President Hamid Karzai was much ahead from his rivals (he won with over 55 percent votes, three times more than any other candidate), this election seems to be a tough and tense competition because none of the candidates is so far able to show too much support from people to help him\her to be perceived as a clear winner. In addition, by announcing a joint strategy, opponents of President Hamid Karzai have vowed that they will not let him to win easily.

 “We have one competitor, and we are focused on the one competitor,’ Ashraf Ghani, the hopeful candidate and former finance minister, told Nancy A. Youssef of mcclatchydc.com on July 14, 2009.

 Similar views were expressed by some other candidates rival to President Karzai, and though he may have reserved a good amount of electoral votes by mustering support of a few powerful and influential commanders and tribal leaders, it is sure that he faces a hard battle for winning.

 On the other end, for security purposes on the poll day, additional foreign troops may be deployed to alleviate voters’ fear about going to polling stations and protect and enable foreign observers and media correspondents to oversee the process.

 As election is the most important event and basic requirement for a democratic system and vital for improvements in people’s lives, the active participation of Afghan youth groups, media organizations, tribal elders, students and common people is a good omen for the building up of democracy and democratic values in Afghanistan.

 No doubt that the country’s worsening security situation does not allow candidates, their supporters and common voters to get together, and visit and listen to each other freely, but the local TV channels, FM radios, Pashto and Dari websites and social networks, and mobile messaging services provide them this opportunity through live debates, political discussions, news updates, opinion pieces, campaign announcements, and sending short messages on mobile phones.

 Keeping all these paradox factors in mind, one cannot predict exactly which path the situation will go in near future, yet one can hope that if there are no major flaws and unexpected delays in the process, the interest of voters will increase and the polling will be completed successfully.