VZCZCXRO8947
RR RUEHBW RUEHIK RUEHPW RUEHYG
DE RUEHBUL #1035/01 1180737
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 270737Z APR 08
FM AMEMBASSY KABUL
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 3707
INFO RUCNAFG/AFGHANISTAN COLLECTIVE
RHEHAAA/NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL WASHINGTON DC
RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK 4407
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHINGTON DC
RHEFDIA/DIA WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/OSD WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/JOINT STAFF WASHINGTON DC
RHMFIUU/HQ USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 KABUL 001035 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE, SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR SCA/FO, SCA/A 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV ECON AF
SUBJECT: GOVERNANCE DEFICIT AGGRAVATES URBAN KABUL'S PROBLEMS 
 
REF: A) Kabul 469 
 B) Kabul 249 
 C) Kabul 112 
 
¶1. (U) Summary:  Kabul remains unable to deliver effectively basic 
municipal services such as electricity, clean water, sewage 
treatment, and trash collection to its rapidly growing population. 
Deficits in services delivery are aggravated by poor governance and 
an inefficient government structure. 
 
¶2. (U) Kabul is failing to deliver basic services to its residents. 
According to official daily electrical power generation reports, 
only 30 percent of the city's population receives occasional 
electricity.  The lucky minority who do averaged only three hours of 
electricity every other day during the recent winter season.  Only 
20 percent of the city has access to even non-potable tap water 
according to Germany's Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural 
Resources.  UN Human Settlements Programme Advisor Richard Geier 
said only 2 percent of Kabul is covered by a sewage system and only 
20 percent is served by a solid waste collection service.  Based on 
information provided by Kabul Chief of Police Major General Mohammad 
Salim Ahsas, there is one police officer for every 750 Kabul 
residents (Washington, DC has one for every 150 residents). 
 
¶3. (SBU) Kabul residents are increasingly expressing their 
disappointment with the government through the media and public 
demonstrations such as the one in the Dasht-e Barchi neighborhood a 
few months ago, which protested the lack of electricity (ref B). 
Complaints dwell on the lack of personal security due to crime and 
the insurgency; poor employment opportunities, electricity and clean 
water shortages; and the accumulations of trash in the streets. 
Mohammad Faqir Bahram, one of Kabul's three deputy mayors, believes 
70 percent of the city's infrastructure was destroyed during the 
country's civil war.  Even if pre-war infrastructure had not been 
compromised, it was designed to support not more than a third of 
today's population.  Another deputy mayor, Dr. Hasan Abdullahi, 
contends that the fundamental issue confronting Kabul is its lack of 
effective leadership and management.  Compounding those deficits, 
the city's appointed mayor has been changed five times in the last 
six years. 
 
¶4. (U) Kabul, which already comprises one-sixth of Afghanistan's 
population, continues to grow because it is the only option for many 
returning refugees and insurgency-displaced IDPs, neither of whom 
are likely to return soon, if ever, to their villages.  While 
official statistics are not always reliable, most observers believe 
Kabul's population increased from under 1 million in 2001 to 4.8 
million people today.  Kabul is the country's first mega-city. 
 
A Failure of Governance 
----------------------- 
¶5. (U) Diffuse authority and obscured lines of responsibility 
confuse the citizenry and almost guarantee unresponsiveness to their 
needs.  The central government ministries and provincial authorities 
vie with the municipality for influence and power in Kabul. 
According to Karine Fourmond of the World Bank's Kabul Urban 
Reconstruction Project, President Karzai often intervenes in 
inter-ministerial disagreements over municipal policy.  Deputy Mayor 
Bahram looks to the past for answers to today's problems.  He 
remembers a Kabul that was well run and a cosmopolitan center for 
tourism in the region when he started working for the municipality 
35 years ago.  At the time, the municipality had sole authority over 
basic city functions that are controlled today by several contending 
line ministries (particularly policing including fire and traffic, 
city planning, transportation, electricity, water, and public 
health). 
 
Kabul Loses Revenues, Gains Nothing 
----------------------------------- 
¶6. (U) Not only does a dysfunctional governmental structure compound 
the misery of an overcrowded war-ravaged city, it causes a 
hemorrhaging of revenues to line ministries, which transfer those 
funds to favored provincial constituencies.  Kabul is seen as a cash 
cow by line ministries.  Bahram claimed the Ministry of Finance's 
cancellation last year of the city's authority to collect rental 
taxes (one month of rent per year) and its transfer of licensing and 
permitting authorities to ministries resulted in a 40 percent 
reduction to the municipality's revenue. 
 
Corruption Limits Development 
----------------------------- 
¶7. (SBU) Extremely low civil service salaries feed corruption, which 
 
KABUL 00001035  002 OF 002 
 
 
bleeds development budgets.  Municipal employee salaries are set 
nationally and do not adjust for local inflation.  This is a 
particular hardship to municipal employees in Kabul where the 
international community's presence has increased housing rents 
dramatically.  Average civil service salaries range from USD 45 to 
80 per month in a city where the typical rent for a two-bedroom 
apartment on the outskirts of Kabul is USD 150 per month. 
 
Comment 
------- 
¶8. (SBU) The GIRoA has already started working through its 
Independent Directorate for Local Governance (IDLG) to improve 
governance in the provinces.  We will explore with our Afghan 
partners broadening their governance reform focus to include the 
capital. 
 
WOOD