Afghan parliament rejects majority of Cabinet nominees

Afghanistan's parliament dealt a stinging rebuke to President Hamid Karzai yesterday by rejecting 70 per cent of his nominees for a new Cabinet.

The vote, in which 17 of 24 nominees were turned down, presents Mr Karzai with a severe challenge as he tries to get his second term in office into full swing.

Among those rejected were the incumbent women's affairs minister - the only female in the Cabinet - and the incumbent energy minister, a warlord from a western province whose presence in the Cabinet was widely seen as a sign of Mr Karzai being beholden to regional power-brokers.

Mr Karzai has said he will propose new nominees for the unfilled positions, but it is unclear when those names will be announced.

The nominations, announced in mid-December, aimed to keep 12 current ministers in their posts for a second term. In part, that appeared aimed at satisfying US and Western desires to keep trusted hands in place.

Among those Mr Karzai wanted to keep was Water and Power Minister Ismail Khan. But that raised many hackles because Mr Khan was a warlord in Herat province during the civil war of the 1990s and retains considerable local power. Critics said keeping him indicated the extent to which Mr Karzai appears to be beholden to regional power-brokers at the expense of the whole country's interests.

Many of his new nominees were also criticised as having been picked for reasons other than their competency.

"I think, unfortunately, that the criteria were either ethnicity or bribery or money," politician Fawzia Kufi said before the voting.

The rejection of the women's affairs minister was an awkward blow to Mr Karzai, who has pledged to place more women in high government posts in the traditionally male-dominated society.

Mr Karzai did not propose a nominee for foreign minister. He has asked incumbent Rangin Dadfar Spanta to stay in the post until after the January 28 international conference in London, which is to discuss the way forward for Afghanistan.

In another high-stakes political issue, the chief of Afghanistan's elections commission said yesterday a parliamentary vote would be held in May despite widespread international concern that the country's electoral system needs serious reform.

Elections commission chief Ali Najafi told a news conference the national vote will be held May 22.

However, he said Afghanistan needs about $50 million from the international community to meet the election's estimated budget of $120 million.

It was not clear whether the vote would or could be held if donor countries do not provide the money.

In the wake of last August's heavily disputed presidential election, many critics have pushed Mr Karzai and his government to delay the parliamentary vote. Mr Karzai has insisted that the constitution, which specifies the elections be held by May, must be observed.

A US Congressional delegation that met Mr Karzai in Kabul recently said it had warned the president that holding the election without first enacting substantive electoral reform could undermine support for US aid to the country.

"We did not receive any official reaction from the international community that says that they are not supporting the election," Mr Najafi said. "But in this regard, a paper was made by the United Nations which made certain recommendations and requested certain reforms."

He said reforming the electoral law was one of the issues raised by the international community, however, "it is not in our control, it is up to the parliament to approve the electoral law".