VZCZCXRO2413
PP RUEHPW
DE RUEHBUL #2175 2301001
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 171001Z AUG 08
FM AMEMBASSY KABUL
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 5138
INFO RUCNAFG/AFGHANISTAN COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
RHEHAAA/NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL WASHINGTON DC PRIORITY
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHINGTON DC PRIORITY
RHEFDIA/DIA WASHINGTON DC PRIORITY
RUEKJCS/OSD WASHINGTON DC PRIORITY
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHINGTON DC PRIORITY
RUEKJCS/JOINT STAFF WASHINGTON DC PRIORITY
RHMFIUU/HQ USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL PRIORITY

UNCLAS KABUL 002175 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR SCA/FO, SCA/A, S/CRS 
STATE PASS TO USAID FOR AID/ANE, AID/DCHA/DG 
NSC FOR JWOOD 
OSD FOR SHIVERS 
CG CJTF-82, POLAD, JICCENT 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV AF
SUBJECT: DARI-PASHTO DEBATE DEADLOCKS PARLIAMENT 
 
REF: KABUL 1193 AND PREVIOUS 
 
¶1.  (SBU)  Action in Afghanistan's Wolesi Jirga (the National 
Assembly's Lower House) has stalled over a higher education 
bill because of disagreements over the Pashto and Dari usage 
of the word "university."  The disagreement has stopped most 
activity in the lower house for more than a week, delaying 
consideration of other important bills on election law and 
the country's national development strategy.  The inability 
of MPs to move beyond the dispute shows continued animosity 
from last session's ethnically charged quarrel over 10 Wolesi 
Jirga seats reserved for Kuchi nomads (reftel) has not fully 
subsided. 
 
¶2.    (SBU)  After a fast start to the new legislative 
session that began on July 22, action at the Wolesi Jirga 
ground to a halt last week over the higher education bill's 
supposed favoring of one of the country's two official 
languages over the other.  Pashtun nationalist MPs charge the 
Dari word for university, "Danesh-Gah," is a foreign word of 
Farsi/Iranian origin that should not be used for official 
government business.  Dari-speaking Tajiks, Uzbeks, and 
Hazaras counter the term is just as prevalent in Afghan 
society as the Pashto "Pohantoon."  MPs agree the 
Constitution designates Dari and Pashto as the country's two 
official languages and offers protections to speakers of 
other minority languages, but some Pashtuns have decried what 
they see as Farsi words intruding on Afghan culture (Dari and 
Farsi are mutually intelligible to native speakers). 
 
¶3.    (SBU)  MP Saleh Mohammad Regestani (Panjshir, Tajik), 
Legislation Committee chairman, said a small number of 
Pashtun MPs were holding firm on a seemingly minor issue in 
revenge for last session's Tajik-led walkout over 
inflammatory comments by a Pashtun Kuchi MP.  Some parliament 
staff have accused Regestani and other Tajik MPs of egging on 
their Pashtun rivals to make a stand on cultural issues and 
hyping accusations of a "Pashtunization" of the GIRoA led by 
Farouk Wardak, President Karzai's advisor for parliamentary 
affairs.  Regestani knows the debate over language usage 
strikes many outsiders as trivial and hopes to score points 
as a leader in parliament by brokering a compromise.  MPs 
agreed late last week to pass the issue on to a 
constitutional commission to decide whether to accept the 
Dari term or recognize the Pashto word as the sole acceptable 
term for the government's use.  Hopes that this would lead to 
a quick resolution and quiet ethno-linguistic rabble rousing 
may be in vain -- the constitutional commission charged by 
the Constitution with settling these types of matters does 
not yet exist, as the government has not appointed its 
members. 
 
WOOD