On the edge in Afghanistan

We made two good decisions yesterday.

First, when we walked into the stadium (the one where the Taliban used to stone people to death) for Abdullah Abdullah’s rally, we took a look at the rickety wooden stage they’d built for the camera crews to stand on, and decided to set up our tripod on the steps instead.

Which is why Soren, our cameraman, was one of the few who didn’t fall into a big hole in a writhing heap of camera crews and equipment when it collapsed.

The razorwire-topped fence separating the crowd from the journalists and the candidate then gave way under the weight of all the boys who had climbed it to get closer.

Secondly, we decided to leave the area when we felt it was all getting a bit too chaotic, so we’d gone by the time people milling about outside were stoning a passing US military convoy and all the men with concealed weapons started waving them around.  

There’s a feeling in Kabul that we’re on the edge.

Saturday’s car bomb just a few yards from the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) headquarters didn’t help. How did they get through the checkpoint? That’s supposed to be the most secure part of town. Every day there are rumours and reports about car bombs, usually in “a white Toyota Corolla”. But every third car is a white Toyota Corolla!

At the rally, I couldn’t help but notice the casual looking guy in jeans and a red shirt taking photographs. He had a pistol stuck in his belt.

Everyone cheered when a helicopter flew overhead dropping leaflets which fluttered like silver confetti into the crowd. But it turns out they had no permission and the pilots were later arrested for violating the capital’s airspace.

The leading candidate all have their own militia, as do the warlords supporting President Karzai who has a policy that it’s better to have them inside your tent shooting their AK 47s out, than outside aiming their RPGs in.

So where is the fragile flower of democracy in all this?

Gently blooming maybe in the minds of the diplomats and politicians of foreign governments who have shelled out an estimated US$255m (according to the International Crisis Group) for this exercise in electoral freedom.