In last few months, our country went through a number of frightening events. Although some of them were not new and were feared from many years, yet no action was taken by government to avert them. It started with sharp decline in economic activities in the country resulting in great increase in joblessness. This forced large numbers of Afghans leave the country in search of finding bread for their families. Next problem was the tragedy of fall of Kunduz to Taliban and increasing influence of Taliban in a number of provinces of the country. Once again, our government failed to do anything against them. Although there had been continuous alarming reports by the members of civil society and security forces, but no proper action was taken until the tragedy of Kunduz occurred. In the same way, government was not able to show any performance on large number of bomb explosions and terror attacks in Kabul and some other provinces in which hundreds of civilians were killed or injured. Due to this inactiveness of government, these attacks are still on rise and even capital Kabul is not safe. However, the most painful of these is the silence of government and its representatives when people badly needed their support. The silence of government after Kunduz incident and its inactiveness to do anything for the victims of Kunduz has enraged almost all the civilians.
It is a grave fact that our economy is absolutely dependent on foreign assistance and due to the absence of local production, we depend on a number of countries to import almost every commodity. In the last 12 years of democratic government, international donors and their aid agencies were working in large numbers and this made an artificial economic bubble in the country but as the international forces announced to leave Afghanistan, foreign donors also stopped their activities. It was unfortunate that no past government did anything to promote local production. However, when this unity government came, a president good at economics headed it and people were hopeful that he may come up with some projects to boost economic activities in the country but so far, there has been no change in this regard. In last one year of this government, even the necessary reforms have not been brought and still, doing business in Afghanistan is very difficult and challenging.
When Kunduz fell into the hands of Taliban, people of the country protested against government for a number of reasons. First, some dubious decisions were made due to which the city fell into the hands of Taliban. Secondly, government for the victims of this incident has announced no relief program until now. Thousands of people have been displaced who are still waiting for some kind of help from the government. While government is still busy in thinking, a businessperson has rented a house in Kabul for the displaced people of Kunduz where they are given food and clothing as well.
Similarly, the security conditions are worsening with every passing day. Taliban are busy in fighting at a number of provinces and government forces are struggling to keep the control of different areas. This week’s suicide attacks in Kabul and increasing Taliban activities in other provinces is a big question mark on the performance of government. People have absolute trust on the security forces but they fear that due to poor leadership, the performance and effectiveness of our security forces have also declined. Before this, government was in the hope of having negotiations with Taliban but recent atrocities of Taliban in Kunduz have proved that they do not believe in humanity and they can only understand the language of force and they need to be dealt accordingly.
After the incident of Peshawar school attack, Pakistani security forces carried out a massive operation against Taliban and foreign terrorists in the northern areas of Pakistan because of which the attacks of Taliban have greatly decreased and security condition in Pakistan has greatly improved. We also need such an operation and this can only happen when we will close the door of negotiations or compromise with Taliban because past events have shown that they are true enemies of Afghanistan and they need to be dealt accordingly.
On all these occasions, people arranged demonstrations against the silence and inactiveness of government. Demands were made that if government is not able to run the country, it should step down and leave the power for those who can run this country.
Due to the above facts, people are badly losing hope about the future of their country. It is the reason why, they are leaving the country in large numbers. It is the time that government should break its silence and assure masses that government is with them. If government is busy in doing something, it must be brought into the knowledge of people. In the same way, government should also discuss the present situation of Afghanistan with its allies and let people know if they are going to help or not. If our Allied friends are going to continue their support in future, it should be brought into the knowledge of people as it might boost up the confidence of investors, businesspersons and public. But above all, the heads of government; the President and the Chief Executive need to be vocal and make more appearance in general public. At present, people need some words of satisfaction from government if government is not in position of doing something else.