pakistani342
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Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai can do no harm I guess -- a recent post on this form anoints him the Gadot of Afghanistan -- well:
1. Foreign Policy Magazine placed him in its annual list of the Top 100 Global Thinkers.
2. Prospect magazine placed him second in their world thinkers poll.
3. He was also cited by some magazine as one of the top finance ministers -- I don't have the reference handy.
But who is our wizard of Oz?
A. Afghan Ghani, it is incorrectly implied that he is an economic genius with years of experience with the world bank -- his title was Anthropologist at the World bank not an economist as is commonly thought
B. He earned a PhD from Columbia, but failed to secure a tenured academic position at Berkley or John Hopkins Universities (which is a polite way of saying he was shown the door for not being up to par)
C. His work "Fixing Failed States: A Framework for Rebuilding a Fractured World" gets a mixed review -- most of the criticism centers that it is general and cherry picked
D. He has picked as running mate General Dostum -- who needless to say is tainted by war crime charges and human rights abuses. It is also noteworthy that just a few years ago Ghani sab, had bitterly criticized President Karzai for including Dostum in his administration .
“If the goal is to consolidate a group of drug dealers as the government of Afghanistan so that you have relative peace, then what is the vision?” -- Ashraf Ghani
And listen to 0:12 below ("qatil goftast" -- he had called his running mate a killer in the last election when Dostum joined the Karzai's administration)
E. Ghani sab is also known for his temper tantrums (I think petty academic is what I remember him being called) -- (one reference here)
F. One might also ask how Ghani sab has built his current palatial mansion in Kabul -- World Bank and Afghan government salaries cannot pay for real estate that scale (note as a point of reference, in their hey day the narco style palaces in Wazir Akbar Khan neighborhood commanded rents of $10,000 a month)
I would wager if Afghanistan did not suffer an acute lack of qualified technocrats or say Ashraf Ghani was say a Pakistani -- no one would know his name.
As the say in Urdu goes: Andhoon main kana raja -- in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king
1. Foreign Policy Magazine placed him in its annual list of the Top 100 Global Thinkers.
2. Prospect magazine placed him second in their world thinkers poll.
3. He was also cited by some magazine as one of the top finance ministers -- I don't have the reference handy.
But who is our wizard of Oz?
A. Afghan Ghani, it is incorrectly implied that he is an economic genius with years of experience with the world bank -- his title was Anthropologist at the World bank not an economist as is commonly thought
B. He earned a PhD from Columbia, but failed to secure a tenured academic position at Berkley or John Hopkins Universities (which is a polite way of saying he was shown the door for not being up to par)
C. His work "Fixing Failed States: A Framework for Rebuilding a Fractured World" gets a mixed review -- most of the criticism centers that it is general and cherry picked
D. He has picked as running mate General Dostum -- who needless to say is tainted by war crime charges and human rights abuses. It is also noteworthy that just a few years ago Ghani sab, had bitterly criticized President Karzai for including Dostum in his administration .
“If the goal is to consolidate a group of drug dealers as the government of Afghanistan so that you have relative peace, then what is the vision?” -- Ashraf Ghani
And listen to 0:12 below ("qatil goftast" -- he had called his running mate a killer in the last election when Dostum joined the Karzai's administration)
E. Ghani sab is also known for his temper tantrums (I think petty academic is what I remember him being called) -- (one reference here)
F. One might also ask how Ghani sab has built his current palatial mansion in Kabul -- World Bank and Afghan government salaries cannot pay for real estate that scale (note as a point of reference, in their hey day the narco style palaces in Wazir Akbar Khan neighborhood commanded rents of $10,000 a month)
I would wager if Afghanistan did not suffer an acute lack of qualified technocrats or say Ashraf Ghani was say a Pakistani -- no one would know his name.
As the say in Urdu goes: Andhoon main kana raja -- in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king
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