Experts urge govt to avoid politics in security shakeup

KABUL (TOLO News): Military experts and members of parliament on Friday said that reshuffling in the government is a normal routine to improve performance in the institutions, however they called on the Afghan government to skip politics, particularly in the security sector.

They said that in recent years, occasionally, reshuffling of security officials in the Ministry of Interior had been politicized and the move had a negative impact on the performance of the institutions.

This comes a day after Gen. Khushal Saadat, the deputy minister of interior for security, was offered a training position at the Defense Ministry that is not at deputy minister level, and which, by latest reports, he has not accepted yet.

The Ministry of Interior so far has not commented on Saadat’s new appointment.

Sources have said that Gen. Saboor Qani was appointed to Saadat’s post.

“When someone is promoted from the rank of a Lieutenant to the rank of a top general, it means we’ve violated the law,” said Ewaz, a military expert.

“The Afghan police must be directed to their original duty, which is implementing the rule of law,” said former Deputy Minister of Interior Mirza Mohammad Yarmand.

President Ashraf Ghani appointed Saadat to the post a year ago.

Some lawmakers have said that Saadat’s appointment to the post was political.

“The deputy minister of interior for security, who has been just been appointed, is a professional man and an academic cadre; I think it will have a good impact on the Ministry of Interior and also in the provinces, particularly in the remote areas of Afghanistan,” said MP Mohammad Sadiq Qaderi.

Gen. Qani had previously worked in several departments of the National Directorate of Security (NDS) in the provinces.

“This shouldn’t be a political appointment and it should a professional appointment. It is not appropriate that one day you award unlimited authority to someone, and the other day you snatch it back,” said Abdul Rahman Wardak, MP