Security forces, including Army commandos and Afghan helicopters, besieged the house of Nizamuddin Qaisari In Mazar-e-Sharif for nearly 20 hours starting late Saturday night in an attempt to arrest Qaisari and his “150” men who were “illegally-armed” and were charged with causing “instability” in the city.
But the situation is irregular, and many are wondering about the real motives and political situation behind his attempted arrest.
Nizamuddin Qaisari is former police chief for Qaisar district, Faryab, and a commander of public uprising forces and he was arrested before along with twenty of his men by the Afghan Army’s 209 Shaheen Corps in November 2018 and charged with a “violation of human rights.”
He is 51 years old and was born in Qaisar district in the northern province of Faryab. First, he was a farmer and businessman but then became the commander of local police in 2011.
After being arrested in Faryab, he was brought to Kabul and then he was released.
Many are questioning why the government launched a big operation against his house to arrest him again in the northern province of Balkh this week on Friday.
The government accuses Qaisari of “repeating his crime” but his supporters say there is a political motivation for this decision.
His arrest last November was followed by 19 days of protests from his supporters and the supporters of first Vice President Abdul Rashid Dostum in Balkh, Faryab, Baghlan and Kabul provinces.
He was under arrest by the government for six months.
Some lawmakers told TOLOnews that the decision to arrest him again is a political move.
“The government should have acted through legal ways if these individuals are really irresponsible and or if they have committed a crime,” said
Hamidullah Bek, an MP. “An individual named Anwar-e-Lochak there (in Balkh) loots money during the day but he is not arrested and there is a double standard in implementing the law.”
“Come to Kabul and see that there are hundreds of mafia types who have grabbed people’s lands, they are terror mafia, they are drugs mafia. Why is the government is silent towards them?” asked Zabihullah Atiq, an MP.
Qaisari was a close aide and a successor of Dostum in Faryab but after the September presidential elections, his ties were cut off with Dostum.
The National Islamic Movement of Afghanistan, or Junbish-e-Milli party, led by Dostum – to which Qaisari belongs – said the issue has been handled politically.
“Mr. Qaisari has been used as a political card against Junbish and its leadership,” a spokesman of the party, Bashir Ahmad Tahyanj, said.
After he was released last December, Qaisari thanked President Ghani and Dostum for his release but later he opposed the first vice president.
In an interview with TOLOnews, Qaisari said some people from Ghani’s election campaign asked him to join them in the elections but he had not made a decision on it.
Days ahead of the September election, he announced his support for a presidential candidate and former NDS chief Rahmatullah Nabil’s election campaign team.
“The treatment towards Qaisari’s case was political from the beginning. He was released from the NDS guesthouse and they tried to use him as an alternative for Gen. Dostum,” Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah’s spokesman Mujib Rahman Rahimi said.