VZCZCXRO1077
PP RUEHPW
DE RUEHBUL #2913/01 3070655
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
P 020655Z NOV 08
FM AMEMBASSY KABUL
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 6049
INFO RUCNAFG/AFGHANISTAN COLLECTIVE PRIORITY

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 KABUL 002913 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR SCA/FO, SCA/A, S/CRS 
NSC FOR JWOOD 
OSD FOR MCGRAW 
CG CJTF-82, POLAD, JICCENT 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/07/2018 
TAGS: PGOV AF
SUBJECT: UNITED NATIONAL FRONT NEITHER UNITED NOR NATIONAL 
 
REF: A. KABUL 1460 
     ¶B. 07 KABUL 3774 
     ¶C. KABUL 2856 
 
Classified By: Political Counselor Alan Yu for reasons 1.4 (B) and (D) 
 
¶1. (C//NF)  SUMMARY.  The United (National) Front, the main 
political opposition to President Karzai in Parliament and 
the upcoming presidential election campaign, has attempted to 
present itself as a unified coalition of pan-ethnic and 
pan-regional political parties committed to opposing a second 
Karzai presidency.  However, its inability to lock down 
support among non-Tajik groups and identify a credible 
presidential candidate has hurt its chances for winning next 
year's election and implementing its decentralization-focused 
agenda.  In fact, despite lofty talk from UF officials that 
the party is a national entity, little evidence exists that 
the coalition is anything more than a small circle of leaders 
from the majority-Tajik Jamiat-e-Islami party and minor 
politicians loyal to them.  Other factions, parties, and 
individuals are allies of convenience, associating with the 
UF when it is to their advantage, but reluctant to publicly 
commit to the coalition.  One of the UF's best hopes for 
success next year is to nominate a presidential candidate who 
can hold together a northern ethnic alliance while Karzai and 
other Pashtun candidates divide support from the south and 
east.  But despite UF leaders' frequent statements that this 
chosen leader is about to be anointed, we have seen no 
evidence the UF itself has come to a consensus.  In fact, the 
coalition's failure to make its operations transparent and 
include input from lower-ranking members may derail its 
long-term goals to lead the country. 
 
Initial Promise Loses Momentum 
---------- 
 
¶2.    (C//NF)  Influential northern political leaders, 
warlords, and mujahideen leaders from the war against Soviet 
occupation formed the United Front in early 2007, hoping to 
win a broad consensus for decentralization, elected 
governors, and constitutional reforms to overhaul the 
country's parliamentary system.  Tajik founders, including 
former president Burhanuddin Rabbani, Lower House Speaker 
Yunus Qanooni, and military leader Mohammad Fahim Khan, 
initially appeared set to lock up major support beyond their 
own ethnic group, but have been unable to show definitive 
progress in the coalition's first 18 months toward this goal. 
 A second tier of leaders, including the late king's grandson 
and Pashtun Mustafa Zahir Shah and First Vice President Ahmad 
Shah Massoud, both recruited to attract a wider base of 
popular support, remain outside the UF's decision-making 
process.  Rabbani, with occasional coordination from Qanooni 
and Fahim, sets the course for the UF, just as he does for 
his Jamiat-e-Islami party.  Without public support from any 
major non-Jamiat group, it is often difficult to distinguish 
between UF and Jamiat. 
 
¶3.    (C//NF)  The UF initially appeared to welcome 
non-Jamiat factions into its inner circles.  UF boosters 
pointed to the leadership's decision to grant each party or 
faction one or more seats on the coalition's executive 
committee as evidence of a pan-Afghan opposition force taking 
shape.  However, many of the smaller parties were in fact 
Jamiat spin-offs stemming from personal squabbles with 
Rabbani or dislike of his refusal to democratize Jamiat. 
Qanooni's New Afghanistan Party or former UF spokesman 
Mustafa Kazimi's Hezb-e-Eqtedar were two parties folded into 
the UF, but whose membership and history overlapped 
significantly with Jamiat.  Although at first successful in 
winning endorsements from Uzbek and Hazara leaders, the UF 
has been unable to secure solid endorsements from some of the 
major leaders they advertise as "on the verge" of joining the 
coalition.  Moreover, many supposed UF members not associated 
with its Jamiat base make little effort to hide their 
associations with other politicians, including President 
Karzai. 
 
Non-Tajik Groups Skeptical to Fully Commit 
---------- 
 
¶4.    (C//NF)  UF spokesmen tell us nearly every week Hazara 
leader MP Haji Mohammad Mohaqqeq's endorsement is imminent. 
The news would certainly be a big coup for the coalition, as 
Mohaqqeq's popularity has brought him to the top of Hazara 
politics and an endorsement of him could move more than a 
million Hazara votes into the UF's column next year.  But 
week after week, even when evidence shows he is critical of 
Karzai (ref A), Mohaqqeq remains silent.  In conversations 
 
KABUL 00002913  002 OF 003 
 
 
with us, Mohaqqeq comes off as ambivalent or hesitant to play 
his cards too soon.  MP Ustad Mohammad Akbari (Bamyan, 
Hazara), Mohaqqeq's rival for leadership of the 
majority-Hazara Hezb-e-Wahdat party, is generally supportive 
of the UF, but Hazara voters will follow the more popular 
Mohaqqeq wherever his endorsement leads them.  Outside of 
Kabul, Mohaqqeq's supporters, such as the head of Balkh's 
provincial council, say they are waiting for their leader to 
make an endorsement before they commit to the United Front. 
 
¶5.    (C//NF)  The Uzbek-dominated Junbesh-e-Milli party, 
formerly led by Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum, also has yet to 
clearly align itself with the UF despite the UF's insistence 
that Junbesh is a full member.  Junbesh Chairman Sayed 
Noorullah recently told PolOff he refused to endorse the 
coalition, calling the group a collection of undemocratic 
warlords, and has personally lobbied Mohaqqeq to do the same. 
 But as with many aspects of Uzbek politics, it matters 
little what Noorullah or pro-UF Junbesh MPs like Shakar 
Kargar (Faryab, Uzbek) and Faizullah Zaki (Jowzjan, Uzbek) 
think.  Instead, Uzbek votes are tied to the endorsement of 
Dostum, who has played to both the UF and Karzai in recent 
months (ref C).  Dostum may only be selling his endorsement 
to the side that can offer him the most, which currently 
appears to be Karzai and makes any alliance with the 
out-of-power UF tenuous. 
 
¶6.    (C//NF)  UF leaders figure one of their best chances to 
win the presidency is with a Pashtun at the top of the ticket 
as a means of carving into that ethnicity's plurality of 
Afghan votes, but they have had little success recruiting 
significant numbers of Pashtun supporters.  Qanooni was able 
to win Pashtun support in the Lower House for his election as 
Speaker, but this has not translated into loyalty outside of 
Parliament.  The few Pashtuns who have stepped forward as UF 
members, such as Mustafa Zahir Shah, have been unimpressive 
as politicians and have not inspired confidence even inside 
the UF's executive committee.  Rabbani advisor Sediq Chakari 
said Zahir has fallen out of contention to carry the UF's 
banner as a presidential candidate next year.  Statements by 
UF MPs criticizing Karzai for the so-called "Pashtunization" 
of the government by appointing increasing numbers of 
Pashtuns have not helped recruit new members in the south and 
east. 
 
Institutional Support Lacking 
---------- 
 
¶7.    (C//NF)  The UF's public relations success early on was 
dealt a blow with the loss of its skilled spokesman, Kazimi, 
killed in the November 2007 Baghlan bombing.  Sayed 
Sancharaki, Kazimi's replacement, has a certain proficiency 
dealing with the media, but little infrastructure to support 
his efforts.  Rabbani keeps most of Jamiat's resources to 
himself, with other high-ranking leaders similarly unwilling 
to invest personal resources in the coalition.  Unlike other 
parties -- including Hezb-e-Islami, Junbesh, and Republican 
-- neither the UF nor Jamiat has serious plans to hold a 
party conference for national members or open its leadership 
elections to the public eye. 
 
¶8.    (C//NF)  As a coalition of political leaders, the UF by 
its nature has nearly no rank-and-file members from which to 
draw funds or popular support - constituent parties prefer to 
keep their supporters identifying with them first, then the 
UF.  Also, with its closed-door meetings in Kabul, the UF 
executive committee has no outreach efforts to potential 
supporters elsewhere in the country.  Even MPs aligned with 
the coalition only receive instructions following executive 
committee decisions and have little if any opportunity to 
provide their own input.  After several requests, Sancharaki 
supplied PolOff with contact information for a UF supporter 
in the North, who Sancharaki described as a regional leader 
for Balkh province.  However, upon meeting this person, it 
was obvious he had little regular contact with the UF and was 
off-message on many of the coalition's recent positions. 
 
Trouble Finding a Candidate a Sign of Other Difficulties 
---------- 
 
¶9.    (C//NF)  In conversations with UF members, it is 
becoming more noticeable that the coalition's leaders have 
not made much progress in selecting a candidate since the 
summer, when they said they would announce their choice by 
November.  The UF certainly remains a powerful force in 
Afghan politics, if only because of the influential names in 
its inner circle, but there are doubts whether the group can 
build a majority coalition to govern the country if its 
 
KABUL 00002913  003 OF 003 
 
 
leaders hold to their Jamiat-centric mindset.  This central 
leadership does not have enough faith in second-tier members 
to hand over the nomination, and there is too much distrust 
among them to select one of their own. 
 
¶10. (C//NF)  There are many indications the UF has looked 
outside of the coalition for a candidate, a sign that, like 
all parties in Afghanistan driven by personalities and not 
politics, the leadership is first hoping to be on the winning 
side, then worrying about the governing of the country.  If 
the UF endorses a candidate from outside the coalition, it 
will be a sign of its weakening influence and inability to 
hold together the ethnic alliance that looked so promising 18 
months ago.  But if the UF does run a candidate of its own, 
and Uzbek and Hazara endorsements go elsewhere, the 
credibility of the UF as a pan-ethnic coalition will also be 
weakened.  It's doubtful the UF, under its current 
leadership, will reform its operations to become more 
transparent and encourage greater participation by 
rank-and-file supporters.  However, absent changes in those 
areas, the UF will find itself a step behind Afghanistan's 
other political parties, many of which may prove to be more 
adept at rallying supporters ahead of next year's 
presidential election. 
WOOD