KABUL As Afghanistan prepares for its next test as an infant democracy, a crop of bright young men and women is challenging the traditional Afghan belief that power lies in beards and turbans.
The countrys second parliamentary poll is scheduled for September 18, with about 2,500 candidates contesting the 249 seats in Afghanistans Wolesi Jirga, or lower house of parliament.
Afghanistans politics are infamously partisan, and the parliament is stacked with people with bloody or questionable pasts, seen as using their connections and positions to enhance personal power and wealth.
Almost a decade after the fall of the Taliban, a new activism is creeping into Afghan politics, with an up and coming generation of politicians ignoring Taliban threats in a bid to turn the tide of corruption and patronage.
While the UNDP says 68 per cent of a population estimated at 35 million is younger than 25 years, the view that only older men are qualified to lead has proved difficult to shift.
But years of corrupt and ineffective government have attracted a wide range of younger candidates, many of whom believe they can do better than the bearded elders who have presided over 30 years of war and misery.
First-time candidates include television personalities, comedians, actresses and sports stars. Many are considered opportunists, and observers say some will be carried to victory on the recognition factor alone.
Many others are earnest in their desire to work for a better Afghanistan, keen to pay back the country for their education by working on its behalf.
Janan Mossazai says a seat in parliament would help him give voice to Afghans disillusioned by democracy, having watched impotently as massive fraud marred last years presidential poll, which returned Hamid Karzai for a second five-year term.
“I want to give every individual voter his or her due,” said 30-year-old Mossazai, running in Kabul after returning recently from studies in Canada and Central Asia.
Giving every Afghan a voice Mossazai said he wanted to convince Afghans it was worthwhile to participate in the running of their country, and that by doing so they could have a say in what sort of society they left to their children.
“Afghanistan is not an easy place to give people a true voice because there are vested interests who see their survival in the continuation of the chaos here,” he told AFP.
He said he aimed to use his campaign to “make connections with like-minded candidates across the country,” in the hope of pulling together a group that could become the basis of party politics now missing from Afghanistan.
“Sound political parties have to be the foundation of strong political development,” he said, adding that his focus would be bringing peace to Afghanistan with the cooperation of outside interests.
Many of Afghanistans troubles with the Taliban are traceable to Pakistan, where the groups leadership is based and which is the source of fighters, funds and the fertiliser used to make ubiquitous roadside bombs.
The United States and Nato have almost 150,000 troops in the country, trying to quell an insurgency that is spreading, the momentum now widely seen as in the Talibans favour.
Campaigning for the poll, which got underway in late June, has already been tainted by assassinations and threats from the Taliban, who consider the election a manifestation of Afghanistans occupation by Western forces.
In the past two months, one candidate was abducted and beheaded in Ghazni province, south of Kabul, one died in a suicide bomb attack at a mosque while campaigning in eastern Khost province, while a similar attack in Herat killed the brother of candidate Abdul Hadi Jamshidi.
The Free and Fair Election Foundation of Afghanistan (FEFA), an independent monitor, said election-related violence was escalating as the poll neared.
Election authorities have said that 938 out of a total 6,835 polling centres will not open on election day because security cannot be guaranteed.
“Im aware of the risks and dangers that are out there that threaten every individual candidate,” said Mossazai.
“I made my decision to run with that awareness. Afghans who want to make a better future for Afghanistan have to make sacrifices.”
Fear that rights will be sacrificed
Fear that Karzai, who wants to make a deal with the Taliban to end the war, will sacrifice hard-won constitutional rights to do so, is the motivation for 28-year-old Farkhunda Zahra Naderi.
Like Mossazai, she is campaigning for one of Kabuls 33 seats, nine of which must be won by women.
The daughter of the spiritual leader of Afghanistans Ismaili sect, Sayed Mansoor Naderi, Farkhunda travels in a red, armoured Hummer driven by a bodyguard, and is trailed by a cameraman videotaping her every move.
"My parliamentary platform is on womens rights and human rights," she said.
"I believe the rights women have are not enough, women need to ensure their rights through political rights. Women have a presence in two of the three branches of government, (legislative) and executive, but not the judiciary.
"Our constitution is subservient to Islamic law, so women need to know their Islamic rights. No women in the judiciary means interpretation of the law is done by men, so womens rights cannot be guaranteed," she said.
"Until women get into the Supreme Court their rights are superficial and symbolic only."
Naderi has co-opted the burqa -- the pleated, voluminous, synthetic cover-all worn by many Afghan women -- in her campaign because, she said, it is an internationally-recognised symbol of Afghan womanhood.
But rather than wear it as her compatriots do, over her head with only a small mesh window to see through, she uses the fabric to create a more modern look that is simultaneously modest, high-necked and full-length, yet quirky.
Her thick black hair is covered in a fashionable scarf that matches the slate-blue of the burqa fabric, which has been cut into a tight-waisted, sleeveless dress, which she wears over a long-sleeved black top.
She uses the distinctive burqa fabric, she said, because "it is part of my identity," though as a modern, wealthy and well-connected young woman, it is up to her if and how she wears it, a choice millions of Afghan women do not have.
On a mannequin in her campaign headquarters in suburban Kabul, she shows off her piece de resistance, a Western-style graduation gown made from burqa fabric with a matching mortar-board.
This, she says, is how Afghan women should be wearing the burqa, as a celebration of their achievements.
"Afghanistan can only solve its own problems if young people go into politics to do things for their country," she said.- AP
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