[Peace-discuss] Malalai Joya on Obama, "The second Bush"

[C. G. Estabrook]

     "Any hope I had in the ballot box bringing change in Afghanistan is gone"
     If Karzai's re-election was a fraud, Obama's surge of troops brought
     just more violence. For Afghans he's the 'second Bush'
     by Malalai Joya in Kabul

One year ago Hamid Karzai was declared re-elected as president of
Afghanistan, ending an election that had no legitimacy in the eyes of
ordinary Afghans. The presidential election last year was a fraud, with
ballot stuffing, vote buying and massive corruption reported by the
world's media. Even if the independent election commission had not
cancelled the planned run-off between Karzai and his main challenger,
Abdullah Abdullah, it would have represented only a choice of the "same
donkey with a new saddle". People had no incentive to participate as
they knew that both main candidates would bring nothing positive for
Afghan people.

Karzai had lost his popularity way before the 2009 election. This was
due to the ever increasing corruption of the government, the
never-ending crimes of the many fundamentalists and warlords in his
regime, and the financial scandals and corruption of his brothers. In
Kandahar people even started calling Ahmed Wali Karzai the "little
Bush", after the hated US president.

The vast majority of Afghans have lost all hope in Karzai. For us his
words and actions have no value, and that includes his latest "peace
negotiations" and other measures. Including killers like Mullah Omar and
Gulbuddin Hekmatyar in the government is not about negotiating for
peace, but completing the decades-old circle of warlordism and
fundamentalism.

It's important to say that these so-called elections haven't damaged
Afghanistan as much as the US and its Nato allies have, with their
bombing and occupation. Wikileaks has exposed some of the truth about
the civilian toll of this war against the Afghan and Iraqi peoples.
Afghans hold the US and Nato, and their puppet Karzai, responsible for
these war crimes. They claim to fight terrorism, but in fact they are
the biggest terrorists in the eyes of our people because of their crimes
and brutalities.

Unfortunately the Afghan people are not yet strong enough to drive out
the US, overthrow the mafia government of Karzai and bring an end to the
crimes of the Taliban and other fundamentalists. Our history proves that
this resistance to occupation will continue until we have won our
freedom. Until both the US and the fundamentalists – of both the
Northern Alliance and Taliban brands – are driven out of power in
Afghanistan, we cannot see a bright future. It is now more than five
years since I was elected to the Afghan parliament. My experience of
this "democratic process" was to see my microphone cut off, and to be
threatened with death by other MPs – many of whom teamed up to remove me
illegally from my seat. My case alone is enough to prove that women's
rights in Afghanistan have not truly been safeguarded – our situation
was just invoked to justify the war.

In fact, it's important to remember another document that Wikileaks
exposed earlier this year: a CIA paper assessing western public opinion
on the war that recommended using "testimonials by Afghan women"
expressing fear about a Taliban takeover in the event of Nato pulling
out. A Time cover story featuring the disfigured Bibi Aisha was a clear
example of using the plight of women as war propaganda. The headline –
"What happens if we leave Afghanistan" – could have, or should have,
been "What happens while we are in Afghanistan", because crimes of
mutilation, rape and murder against women are commonplace today.

Many warlords and commanders aligned with Nato and Karzai carry out
their sexist, misogynist crimes with impunity. Time could, for example,
have done a cover story condemning the law signed by Karzai in 2009 that
legalised crimes against Shia women, or about the shocking levels of
women committing suicide by self-immolation.

We had another so-called parliamentary election in September, but I
chose not to run. Any hope I had for using the ballot box to achieve
change in Afghanistan is gone. Like last year's presidential vote,
September's election was full of the buying and selling of votes – one
province, Paktika, reported a turnout of 626%. This sort of thing is the
reason elections in Afghanistan long ago became a bad joke.

Tomorrow there is an election in the US, and it is now two years since
Barack Obama was elected president. His surge of troops has brought only
a surge of violence, and his expansion of the war into Pakistan has
claimed many innocent lives. Obama promised "hope" and "change", but
Afghans have seen only change for the worse. Here he is now seen as a
"second Bush".

The only change that can make us hopeful about the future is the
strengthening and expansion of a national anti-fundamentalist and
democracy-loving movement. Such a movement can be built only by Afghans.
And while we want the world's support and solidarity, we neither need
nor want Nato's occupying forces.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2010/nov/02/hope-ballot-box-afghanistan-gone