Armanshahr Foundation, is pleased to invite you to its 55th (year IV) public Seminar GOFTEGU, a bridge between the elite and the citizens, to be held in cooperation with the Foundation for Culture and Civil Society.
In the run-up to the parliamentary elections, Armanshahr Foundation is organising a series of Goftegu debates under the heading of “Face to Face”, as in the period prior to the presidential election, with the aim of establishing direct dialogue between the citizens on the one hand and the candidates and the officials on the other.
Face to Face: From First Parliament to Second Parliament:
Parliamentarian candidates and the citizens
Parliamentarian candidates: Mr. Sardar Muhammad Rahman Oghli, Partpal Sengh Pal, Nazari Paryani, Janan musazay
Moderator: Ajmal Baluchzada
Date & Time: Thursday, 29th Julay 2010, 14 hours
Venue: Foundation for Culture and Civil Society, Deh Afghanan, Salangh Wat, across from KabulProvince Police Station
Contact Tel: 0779217755 & 0775321697
E-mail: armanshahrfoundation@gmail.com
Seminar held in Dari
PLEASE BRING THIS INVITATION OR ITS COPY
This Programme is supported by the European Commission. However the programme is the sole responsibility of Armanshahr Foundation and does not reflect the Commission’s opinion.
Armanshahr Foundation/OPEN ASIA is a member of the International Federation for Human Rights
“One who rubs us off with pencil is same as one who kills us”
The 55th Goftegou –parliamentary Face to Face – public debate of Armanshahr was held on 29th July 2010, where general election candidates Messrs Nazari Pariani, Janan Muszai, Rahman Oghli and Partiyal Sangpal started by offering their reasons for standing for election and their programmes.
Mr. Muszai started by narrating his experience at the Kabul Conference, where he had unofficially participated: Unfortunately, all the participating countries had their plans and strategy based on their national interests, except Afghanistan. They all have united teams dedicated to advancing their plans.
He went on: There is a need for a proper manifestation of the people’s will. Despite all the economic and political problems, all the distrust and disputes, the relative stability caused by the presence of foreign forces provide an opportunity in some provinces to play an active role in running the country by electing capable MPs.
The 30 years of war destroyed the cultural and physical infrastructure and forced the people o migrate, but they had one positive outcome: The level of understanding, education and capacities of the people increased. According to UN figures, 70% of the people are younger than 25 years. They have been educated during migration, gained work experience and are opposed to war and violence.
Mr. Muszai said he had three important priorities if elected: 1) Cooperating with like-minded MPs o establish councils of young people in districts and villages to promote reconciliation between the urban and rural people; establishing coherence between the two groups through sports, social activitiesand charity work in the districts and villages; 2) Establishing schools and professional colleges; 3. Establishing universities for women with dormitories in cities other than Kabul with government funding.
On transitional justice, he believed: Transitional justice is not confined to trial of criminals; all crimes against humanity and war crimes must be examined and investigated. There must be guarantees that past crimes will not recur; and rights of minorities and other people must be respected.
Mr. Muszai was asked: “Why did the good plans of the international community fail in Afghanistan? How do you evaluate the expansion of insecurity in the north and south despite the presence of foreign forces?”
He replied: For two reasons. 1) The first concerns the internal issues; the people’s will and suffering does not play a role in choosing leaders in Afghanistan. That means that leaders who have taken power here are not desired by the people. Those leaders have created a political system in the past eight years on the basis of pre-arranged ideas and have not been capable of thinking about national interests of Afghanistan. 2) Ever since its intervention in Afghanistan, the international community decided to support people with short-term plans who lacked legitimacy and popular base. The international community engaged in deals with that group of dealers and the result was the failure of long-term plans and lack of good relations with our neighbours.
The second speaker, Mr. Pal, an Afghani Hindu, who has lived in Afghanistan all his life, said: After the jihad government, the transitional government did not include the Hindus or the Sikhs in the Administration; neither in the Constitution nor in the national anthem. With the exception of Ms. Anarkeli Honaryar and one senator, we have nobody at high levels of government. Unfortunately, after all those years we have lived here, they still ask us: ‘When did you come here and when are you going to return home?’ During the past decades, we helped the Communists and then the Jihadis, but that has been forgotten. They all achieved high positions, but the Hindus who were all businesspeople and lived in the Parwan quarter were displaced. I wish to represent all the people. We never had criminals in this homeland. I want to serve the country without betraying it.
On the question of Hindus being barred from becoming president in Afghanistan, he said God is god of all the people of the world not only of Muslims. If we want democracy for Afghanistan, we should not want it for Muslims only.
On the issue of talks with the Taliban, Mr. Pal said: We created the first class and second class Talibs. When you take away somebody’s bread, he would become a Talib. If we catch this Talib today, somebody else would become a Talib. That will be the case as long as the same structure exists.
The moderator asked him about the reason for marginalisation of the Hindus. Mr. Pal replied: Until the era of Dr. Najib, 45,000 Hindus and Sikhs were living in Afghanistan. The best doctors and engineers were Hindus. They scattered during the transitional government. Education of our young people and children was stopped. We are doing our best to revive our people.
The third speaker, Mr. Nazari Pariani, managing editor of the daily Mandegar, said: It should be clear why somebody stands for election. I know that as MP I cannot build universities nor do something [concrete] for the young people, but I can get good laws legislated for their needs. I wish to represent the young people. Unfortunately, many MPs in the previous parliament passed their tasks on to the government owing to flaws in the Constitution or their lack of knowledge about their tasks. On the other hand, the parliament was weak and could not stop certain actions of the government.
Mr. Pariani stated three priorities if elected: 1) determining the basic policy lines of the country and the government; 2) enhancing education through legislation and raising its level; 3) endeavouring to change the level of higher education, in regard to which there is lack of proper and adequate legislation.
Mr. Pariani was asked: “You will be facing the present government in the next government; how do you plan to cooperate with it?” His answer was: If the people elect government-controlled MPs, we will not achieve anything. In that case, the minority must take action against infringement of national interests, through civil disobedience, mobilising the media and resignation.
Another question asked to Mr. Nazari Pariani was: “How is it possible to achieve the ideals if justice is not realised?” He replied: Injustice is not an individual issue or one concerning the government of Afghanistan. I see it in the way the world looks at Afghanistan, in a western-shaped framework. As long as that way of looking or assisting Afghanistan persists, justice will not be established in Afghanistan. How can we expect justice to be realised in Afghanistan when its administration is given to people who were part of the Taliban? We need the following: 1) The basic policy lines of Afghanistan should be decided on the basis of its general interests; 2) Afghanistan should be administered on the basis of plans and nobody must dominate it; 3) Rights of citizens and minorities must be protected through parliamentary legislation; 4) Parliament must force all ministries to have plans and projects or work out a general plan for the government.
The last speaker was Mr. Oghli who is currently MP for Fariab. Criticising the law-opposing attitude of the government during the parliamentary recess, Mr. Oghli deemed the closure of Emrooz TV to be illegal and said: The Media Infringements Committee should have decided about it based on the laws and its own jurisdiction, not the cabinet. In his opinion, freedom of speech and existence of free media in Afghanistan is not an achievement of the government but due to existence of numerous foci of power and presence of foreign forces.
Pointing to establishment of opposition groups in parliament, Mr. Oghli said: The term ‘opposition’ is being used in the parliament in particular after the second presidential election. In the past six months, the parliament has been able to call itself one of the three branches of power in this country and opposition groups have taken shape in it. This is precisely where the existence of political parties rather than individuals in elections gains importance.
The moderator asked Mr. Oghli: “Why has the fulfilment of justice slowed down, why did the parliament not include transitional justice in its agenda? Is the present crisis not rooted in injustice?”
He replied: Justice is the cornerstone of a country. Transitional justice will not be fulfilled when basic justice does not exist. Regarding the passage of the National Reconciliation (Amnesty) Law, it is not clear to the people what is going on within the political circles.
The passage of that law had to do with the internal problems of the parliament at the time. There was talk of dismissing the speaker of parliament, which would usually take place when the speaker is accused of either treason or weak management. In a deal between the two sides, it was agreed that the question of weak management would not be raised in exchange for the passage of the Amnesty Law in order to deprive the media and the civil society of the weapon of transitional justice. Two-thirds of the members of the Housie of Representatives passed the law, but nobody has the right to forgive the ‘right of people.’ It should be noted that this law is not untouchable. It is possible to discuss and amend it in the subsequent parliaments witha petition signed by 50 MPs.
To the question of, “What was the parliamentary mechanism for protecting the right of people and what will it be?” he replied: The problem in Afghanistan is not lack of laws, but enforcement of laws. Citizens may individually or collectively take documents to the judicial authorities and make use of the Constitutional provisions. Definitions of and views about people accused of human rights violations or massacres are not identical. We have not been able to define terrorism after nine years and we cannot fight it if we cannot define it. There are individual and collective interpretations in regard to all these cases. The civil institutions have had a weak performance in this respect. They should have their definitions. We have not noticed strong ideas from civil institutions. What has the Independent Human Rights Commission done? Its positions have not differed from government’s policies. In regard to transitional justice, we need: 1) a definition; 2) consequences of its implementation should be examined without political motivations; 3) we should have a comprehensive strategy from the east to the west, from the south to the north. We cannot suffice to Western definitions. They call some people violators of human rights; the same people are called resistant fighters in the orient.
Mr. Oghli viewed positively Turkey’s experience in building governments and said there the shadow government reacts whenever the national interests are in danger.
In the second part of the meeting, the participants asked many questions in particular to Mr. Oghli in his capacity as a serving MP. On the reasons why district or mayoral elections have not been held, he said: The Constitution has foreseen many elections, but it has not assessed the national capacity for so many elections. The previous election were organised with the help of foreigners. On the other hand, our people are not ready to take part in elections. Unfortunately, Afghanistan is living in the 13th Century in this regard and it is not possible to administer free and transparent elections in the country as a whole.
Mr. Oghli said systematisation of the presence of foreign forces in Afghanistan depends on having a powerful, accountable government that the people trust. On the other hand, he said, Article 45 of the Security Council resolution has given a legal basis to the presence of foreign forces to fight terrorism and that prevents systematisation of their presence.
Mr. Pal was asked: “It seems that you are in favour of the presence of Taliban in Afghanistan. You have not been able to achieve your rights under the present democratic system. How can you achieve them under the Taliban?” He replied: In my opinion, the one who rubs us off with pencil is the same as the one who kills us.
Replying to a question about transitional justice, Mr. Nazari Pariani said: The main aim of transitionaljustice is accountability for the past and then putting on trial the perpetrators of crimes. Unfortunately, transitional justice is currently not a process but a political project in Afghanistan. Certain circles are trying to use it to force out one group in favour of another. I support the administration of punishment inthe human society. Regarding transitional justice, not only the periods of war but despotism of Zahir Shah should be examined.
Mr. Muszai had left the meeting before the question time.
Invitation
