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Kabul, Afghanistan (June 17, 2009) – Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, a former Finance Minister and Chancelleor of the University of Kabul, officially launched his campaign for president of Afghanistan today at an event with supporters in Kabul.
“Afghanistan gave Karzai a fair chance to lead and he failed. His failed governance gave room to an insurgency that endangers Afghans first and then the rest of the world, and sanctioned the looting of our land. Karzai’s indulgence to corruption has become so destructive that today 60 percent of Afghans say the country is going in the wrong direction. I am running to offer all Afghans an alternative they desperately need – honest leadership, experience in governance and proven ideas to bring jobs and justice back to Afghanistan,” said Ashraf Ghani.
Thousands of Afghans have already joined Ghani’s campaign for change and a New Beginning. Using traditional social ties and new technology, such as the campaign’s web site www.ashrafghani.af, Ghani has attracted more than 8000 volunteers in Kabul and the provinces, and tens of thousands of supporters around the world. After officially launching this week, Ghani plans to meet a wide range of stakeholders from across the country. His supporters from the eastern region called upon met with him in Kabul and left in conveys for provinces of Laghman, Nangarhar, Kunar and Nuristan, planning to mobilize the villages and towns in each of these provinces. He will be meeting with groups of women, students, and representatives of urban neighborhoods of Kabul.
Ghani’s campaign is structured to create dialogue with voters by describing concrete plans, for example, an economic plan to create 1 million new jobs focuses on the agriculture, construction, mining, power, water and telecommunications and information technology sectors.
“When I was finance minister I completed a reform every four months. Our reform of the telecom industry is an example of how you can do things right in Afghanistan. We played hardball with companies to pay fair license fees for a share of our market and ended up with a win-win-win. Afghanistan earned revenue for its budget, more than seven and half million Afghans use cell phones for business and family life, we created new jobs and the operating companies share the profit of more than 1 billion market. Successful reform is not impossible, but it requires leadership, knowledge and fairness. That’s what I’ll bring to the Afghan people as their president,” explains Ghani.
As Finance Minister, Ghani was credited with developing and leading key reforms, such as changing the Afghan currency, building a public finance system, designing national programs such as the National Solidarity Program, which delivers money directly to more than 23,000 Afghan villages, a national health program, modernizing Afghanistan’s telecoms sector. Ghani was recognized as one of Asia’s best Finance Minister for both his innovative ideas and his fair governance.
