Delegate Profile: Deputy Chairman, Mirwais Yasini

Yasini comes from eastern Nangarhar province, one of the two main opium-poppy growing regions of Afghanistan. He was the top vote-winner in his province in the election for delegates to the Loya Jirga and received the most votes from his fellow delegates to serve as deputy chairman of the 502-member body.

Described as a moderate and trusted by many delegates, he serves as deputy under the chairman, Sibghatullah Mujaddidi. He is known to support a political system headed by a strong presidency.

Yasini was born in 1961 in Nangrahar as the son of a maulawi or religious scholar. After the Soviet invasion in 1978, Yasini’s family fled to Pakistan. There he joined two jihadi groups – Maulawi Mohammad Yunus Khalis's Hizb-e-Islami and Pir Ahmad Gailani's Mahaz-e-Melli – mostly because of his family’s connections to the leaders of these two groups. He fought in Tora Bora, Khost and Paktia. But when the jihadi parties took power in Afghanistan in 1992, he broke off contact with them.

In 1986, Yasini began studying international and Islamic Sharia law at Islamabad International University. He graduated in 1993 with a master’s degree in both areas. Instead of practicing law, however, he decided to become a businessman, trading Afghan carpets with Europe.

“There was fighting in my country; no government, no courts, and, especially during Taleban times, there was nothing”, he said, explaining his career choice. “On the other hand, we needed food.”

After the fall of the Taleban in 2001,Yasini returned to Nangarhar Province, where he became head of the provincial Red Crescent. Two months after his return, he was appointed to the finance ministry in Kabul as head of the economic affairs evaluation section of the foreign relations department. He was a delegate from Kama District in Nangarhar Province at the last Loya Jirga held in June 2002. Today, Yasini heads Afghanistan’s Anti-Narcotics Department.

A native Pashtun speaker, Yasini is also fluent in Dari, English, Urdu and Arabic. He is married with three daughters and two sons. His family lives in Islamabad, he said, for the sake of their education. One of sons, however, is living with him now in Kabul in order to learn Pashtu and Dari.

Kohzad, a delegate from Faryab Province, thinks Yasini has been both positive and neutral as a deputy chairman. “He is impartial outwardly, but maybe inwardly he isn’t”, he said.

Nadir Khan Katawazi, a delegate from the southern Paktika province, credits Yasini’s ability to be both unbiased and patriotic for his sudden rise to prominence. “There’s a line that divides fundamentalists and the patriots, and Yasini is on the side of the patriots”, Katawazi said.

But other delegates disagree. Ashraf Ramadan, a delegate from northern Balkh Province, says Yasini owes his current position to support of powerful patrons.

“In the election of Yasini, President [Ahmed] Karzai and the finance minister, Ashraf Ghani, had prominent roles”, Ramadan said. “Yasini is a reflection of Karzai. He is like a bridge between the cabinet and the Loya Jirga.”

Yasini disagreed. “I swear on Allah and the Prophet that I’m not under the influence of Karzai or anyone else”, he said. “The only cause of my success was that people trusted me. I don’t lie or cheat, and I treat the delegates well”, he said.

Hafizullah Gardesh is a staff reporter for IWPR in Kabul. Ezatullah Zawab and Bashir Gawkh are independent journalists from Jalalabad participating in IWPR's Loya Jirga reporting project.