Corruption in Afghanistan: An introduction to one fine mess

By Gary Anderson

Best Defense office of foreign ethics

In 2004-5, I did a study on the
future of the Taliban for Lieutenant General Karl Eikenberry, who was then the
commander of coalition forces in Afghanistan. After the 2001 U.S.-led
intervention, the Taliban had appeared on the run, but three years later, they
were making a comeback. What I found in the study was that the Karzai
government was the chief enabler of the resurgent Taliban movement. Afghan
governmental corruption and incompetence was making the Taliban look good in
comparison, despite years of misrule when that organization was in power. As a
commander, and later as the U.S. ambassador in Kabul, Eikenberry angered Afghan
President Karzai by urging reform, and ultimately failed in his attempts to get
Karzai to clean up his government in a meaningful way. Today, the Taliban are
back in spades. This has damaged every aspect of the U.S. war effort because it
affects security, governance, rule of law, and development. These are the
pillars of coalition strategy in that unhappy country.

Corruption is exacerbated by the
highly centralized Afghan form of government. All provincial (state) and
district (county) officials are appointed by the central government in Kabul.
On paper, there is nothing wrong with centralization. Many highly-developed
democracies such as Japan have basically the same system. It even semi-works in
Iraq. Those countries have good transportation and reliable communication
systems. This allows the central government to control things that go on in
governance in the provinces. None of that is true in Afghanistan. Consequently,
it is nearly impossible for the Kabul government to closely monitor the
performance of governance and development in the provinces, much less remove
incompetent or corrupt officials.

The most pernicious corruption in
our province was caused by the provincial commander of the Afghanistan National
Police, the provincial prosecutor, and the director of public health. The head
cop was a competent administrator, and kept the provincial capital relatively
secure; however, he did so by hoarding personnel and resources badly needed by
the outlying districts that he was supposed to be supervising. Outside the
provincial capital, he was making a handy side-living running a protection
racket for drug dealers and smugglers. Some of his handpicked appointees in my
district were running extortion and burglary rings.

The prosecutor was making his money
by encouraging defense lawyers from all over Afghanistan to send their wealthy
clients to our province where he could guarantee light sentences or mere fines
for serious offenses. The director of public health for the province, one Dr.
Tariq, is a real piece of work. Over three years, he managed to misspend or
divert $9 million dollars of World Bank funding, the vast majority of which was
U.S.-provided.

While working at the district
level, I had success in purging the worst of the bad cops in mid-level
leadership positions by threatening to invite Greg Jaffe of the Washington Post to report on police
corruption. This did cause the chief to replace to purge eight of them. It was
a small start, but a start.

Once I got to the provincial
capital as the governance advisor for the entire province, we caught a few
breaks; they were caused, not by blatant corruption, but by gender issues. What
finally did in the police chief was his reported rape of three female officers
who had the gall to file complaints. Although they were eventually forced to
retract their charges, a national uproar ensued, and the Afghan national
government was embarrassed enough to reassign the top cop. However, to the best
of my knowledge, he has not been held accountable for the rest of the
corruption he fostered.

The prosecutor became a target
because there was national level focus on the fact that many of his client
protection scams were related to so-called "honor killings." In these crimes,
husbands or other relatives kill a woman or girl for embarrassing the family by
such heinous crimes as demanding a divorce or working outside of the house. The
scrutiny was encouraged by us, and allowed our local national security
directorate commander to organize a sting operation that finally jailed him.
However, before he could go to trial, the former prosecutor used his
connections to get permission to travel to Saudi Arabia for the annual Haj
religious pilgrimage. To the best of my knowledge, he is still on the loose.

Despite our compiling a package on
Dr. Tariq and sending it to Kabul, he is still on the job. One of the most
appalling charges is that at least 11 women died in childbirth for lack of
midwives that World Bank funding had provided for the hiring of such medical
personnel in the last year alone.

Almost everyone in the province
knew that all three of these characters were bad actors, but no one could do
anything about it because they were hired and paid by Kabul. It took outside
action by foreigners and the public glare of the media to do what little that
we could. Until the Afghan government allows some form of local public review
of provincial and district officials, the government of Afghanistan will be its
own worst enemy.

Gary Anderson, a retired Marine Corps colonel, was a district
governance advisor in Afghanistan's Badghis Province. With transition of the
district to Afghan security control, he became the provincial governance and
rule of law advisor.