In 2002, we were conducting elections for the emergency Loyal Jirga commission, and I was part of the commission. There was a requirement for the Jirga to have at least one female delegate who met the criteria of reading and writing and to be able to participate in the Jirga. And in the whole of Uruzgan we could not find one with those criteria. And we were literally having a UN chopper flying from one district to another district. We were told that in Deh Rahod there is a midwife worker in a clinic that may meet the criteria. We literally flew there, talked to her, put her on a chopper with a family member, and flew her back to Tarin Kowt and then to Kabul.

Last year I went back to Uruzgan and the Governor called the elders and everybody else in the Governors Hall and there was a group of females coming in. The first row was filled by the male participants, but they insisted that part of that first row was evacuated, left empty for the women, for them to be seated in the front row. I said: Wow, that’s great. And then these women stood up and spoke in front of the elders.

Rule of law is the most important part that Afghanistan people need and implementation of justice can guarantee peace and stability in Afghanistan. You know, all these things are like a chain. If you have rule of law, capital can be safe and we can be sure that if some people spend their money in Afghanistan, and they have money, they will be willing to bring their money and to do their businesses.

But if we don’t have rule of law, nobody will be willing to bring their money to Afghanistan. This is the big problem of Afghanistan. We don’t have rule of law in Afghanistan for the moment, or at least it is very weak. But, if we improve this part, so the other part – under this part – can be guaranteed.

We have 69 women in the parliament, which means that we will go beyond the quota that was enshrined in the constitution. We also have women in the executive branch to work. But I always highlight the fact that the absence of women in the Supreme Court, which is of course the third part of the branch of power, is… their absence is a challenge. This absence has the potential to make the role of women symbolic, if we do not pay more attention to that.

But, generally speaking, now you have women not only in the government, in the parliament. You have women’s presence in the civil society, there they are very vibrant as well. Of course, what we have, we are not satisfied with. We want more. And for that purpose, we do criticise sometimes or most of the time. But that doesn’t mean we don’t have any achievements. We do appreciate the achievements that we have.

After security, the major issue for Afghanistan is corruption. I’m optimistic that we will win the fight against corruption as we have won the war against terror in Afghanistan. I’m saying this because currently people in Afghanistan are confident that they will win the war and also that they will win the fight against corruption. The major issue for us ten years back it was fighting terrorism, but now it’s fighting corruption. So we have succeeded fighting terrorism.

However, there are some security challenges in Afghanistan, but as you can witness from debate, that currently there’s no more talking about making government, building government, but it’s about a good government. There’s not any more talking about building an army, building a police, there’s discussion about quality, because it’s beyond numbers.