Amid cabinet setback, Afghan women face slow political climb

President Hamid Karzai's nomination of a record three female candidates to cabinet posts was a short-lived victory for women in Afghan politics. In rejecting the majority of Karzai's nominees for the second time, Afghanistan's parliament dealt a blow to both the president and women's advocates around the country.

Only one female nominee was approved during Saturday's parliamentary vote, with lawmakers rejecting 10 of 17 candidates from Karzai's second cabinet list, including two women. The only woman among Karzai's first round of nominees also failed to gain approval during a previous vote two weeks earlier.

A spokesman for the president said Karzai would not submit a third list until lawmakers return from a parliamentary recess in late February.

Karzai's revised picks included Amina Afzali, who was approved to head the ministry of work and social affairs, and two candidates rejected by parliament: Palwasha Hassan for the ministry of women's affairs, and Suraya Dalil for the ministry of public health.

Although critics claimed that some nominees were inexperienced or aligned with warlords, women parliamentarians and political experts generally praised the female candidates' qualifications ahead of the vote of confidence. Palwasha Hassan, the rejected nominee to replace outgoing Women's Affairs Minister Husn Bano Ghazanfar, is widely known as a dedicated women's rights activist.

The results are a setback for those Afghan women parliamentarians who supported the new cabinet picks. Though Karzai opted to include three female nominees only after his first candidates were rejected on January 2, the president's decision was seen as a response to mounting criticism from women's rights advocates - and the latest victory in a slow push to raise the political profile of Afghan women.

The Afghan parliament's rejection of Karzai's cabinet picks was a serious blow to the president

Late last year, a press conference was held at the offices of the Afghan Women's Network to voice the panelists' "serious rejection" to the first appointments. "Unfortunately, in the new Afghan cabinet recommended by the president, no positive step for women's inclusion has taken place," their statement read.

Afghan parliamentarian Shinkai Karokhail also helped organize a news briefing with fellow female lawmakers after Karzai chose a woman to head only one of more than 20 government ministries. She told Deutsche Welle that the initial nominations, characterized by the president as a "mirror" of Afghanistan's people, were seen as a disappointment - and not just for women in parliament. The near-exclusion of female names from Karzai's initial set of nominees underscored just how far women have to go in their ongoing struggle to clinch top leadership roles in politics and policy-making in Afghanistan.

For Shukria Barakzai, who has been a member of Afghanistan's parliament since 2005, Karzai's nomination of women to only three of 25 ministry posts was not nearly enough.

"What I really want is to see women in Afghanistan not only be a symbol," she told Deutsche Welle. "I want women to be decision-makers, not only for the ministry of women's affairs."

Karzai did pledge to name several women to deputy minister posts. But Theresa de Langis of the United Nations women's fund UNIFEM said such positions signify a kind of "glass ceiling." De Langis told Deutsche Welle that more must be done to mentor female deputy ministers and other qualified Afghan women.

Afghan women's rights defenders protested the lack of female candidates on Karzai's first cabinet list