A number of political commentators on Sunday said that ethnic issues in the country could end up being worse than the security problems unless a solution is found to tackle the issue from a national platform.

Referring to the controversial case of President Ashraf Ghani’s Second Vice President General Abdul Rashid Dostum’s bodyguards and the recent corruption case involving Kamran Alizai, the chairman of the Herat provincial council, critics said that dealing with such issues from an ethnic perspective could have repercussions for the country.

According to analysts, ethnic issues in the country have been on the rise since the establishment of the National Unity Government (NUG) under Ghani and CEO Abdullah Abdullah.
 
“Provoking the sentiments and ethnic feelings have been used as a beneficial approach during political games, it has been used as a protective wall for the safety of interests of powerful people,” said political analyst Hadi Meeran.

It is believed that it would be difficult to tackle the problem as long as legislative bodies neglect the issue.

“The issue of ethnicity should be addressed in a legal framework as it is a major factor in the politics in Afghanistan,” said journalist Kawa Jibran.

Analysts say that the equal implementation of the law can help to prevent ethnic issues in the country

“Whenever the law is implemented equally on all, there is doubt, then the law will work equally on all regardless of their ethnic background,” said univestiy lecturer Hikmat Shahbaz.

Afghanistan has been grappling with security issues for the past 15 years and analysts say that ethnic issues in the country could further add to the country’s problems.