Afghan businesses in the doldrums

By Charles Haviland
BBC News, Kabul

Many Afghans say they want a stable government

The long-drawn-out presidential election process in Afghanistan has had a stultifying effect on business in the country.

Poor security and continuing uncertainty about the result of the presidential election run-off - or whether there will even be a run-off - and about the character of a future government - all have contributed to the stagnation.

You can see it in the Shahzada market in the heart of the capital, Kabul, on a cold October morning.

A small courtyard is the epicentre of Afghanistan's money exchange business.

Commotion

It heaves with hundreds of Afghan men, greeting each other cheerfully, most clutching wads of foreign currency - Saudi notes, Pakistani ones and many others - and the local Afghani notes, everyone wanting to make exchanges, either for themselves or for their businesses.

The elections have reduced our business by about 50%. Haji Muhammad Amin Jan Khusti

From the courtyard a small staircase leads upwards to a first storey and a second one, too. The whole scene is lined with money exchange shops and banks.

In one shop Haji Muhammad Amin Jan Khusti shares green tea and good yarns with friends who have dropped by. But he has no customers.

The commotion outside is, in fact, deceptive: the exchange business is right down.

His own money exchange is suffering badly because of Afghanistan's incessant political uncertainty.

"One person will say one thing about the election," says the thick-set, turbaned Pashtun man. "Someone else will say something else.

"The elections have reduced our business by about 50%. Most of our customers are people who do business. They get foreign currency from us to pay for the goods they bring from all round the world.

"Now though, the businessmen have stopped their work, they're not changing money, so that's affected our work too."

Haji Amin says many businessmen have been buying goods abroad but won't yet bring them into the country until the final election result is clear. At present they are worried the situation will get worse.

Fearing further militant violence, he wishes there was no second round in the offing.

Fast-food joint

Just across town, in the pleasant, planned suburb of Shar-e-Now, another breed of businessmen is also suffering election-related blues.

For our business everything has its own season Khair Muhammad

Obaidullah Alam Babakerkhail shows me how he is developing the garden of Afghan Fried Chicken Continental, a successful fast-food joint.

He's building an outside barbecue where meat and Afghan naan bread are freshly cooked, a fountain and a stream, even a stage for live music.

Inside, there are rooms to cater for all sorts of people, from the most secular to the most pious of Afghans, and for expatriates too.

Just 22 years old, Obaid has already put a VIP room above the café area, on the first floor. But the second storey is still an empty shell. He plans a state-of-the-art conference room there, fully equipped for 120 people.

But what's the point, he says, if international organisations start pulling out because of political instability?

"Everybody - the local organisation, the international organisation, even the Afghan government - just concentrated on the election," says Obaid, who has been studying overseas and is weighing his investment options.

"Most of the organisations and hotels and international investors have stopped their investing in Afghanistan because everybody is doubting the future of Afghanistan. It might be a better future - and it might be something worse."

Business slump

It has not been solid gloom for Afghan businesses. Not far away is a compound lined with small printing press businesses, the fumes of ink waft out of the shops.

The money exchange business is suffering badly

Khair Muhammad of the Masoud Walid Printing Press says he and others in the trade thrived producing election-related materials.

"For our business everything has its own season," he says.

During the first round of the election, in August, dozens of people standing for political office came to him and his peers to get posters and publicity materials printed. That brought them "much more money" than they usually get.

But it was only temporary and business since August has slumped.

To make matters worse, the main road past his office recently closed to vehicles because of bomb attacks. That's a trend seen in much of Kabul.

Down near the currency exchange, the Kabul river runs through the city centre, though just a trickle in this dry season. A man herds sheep along the muddy bank, which is sometimes the riverbed.

Dozens of bicycles are parked there. All over the place, commerce thrives - there are jewel shops, stalls selling pots and pans, clothing, carpets.

Yet there is a definite malaise in Afghan business. People like fast-food entrepreneur Obaidullah Alam yearn for a rapid end to the current political uncertainty.

He is glad that the fraud of the first electoral round was exposed and that there is to be a run-off. But only with security and stability, he says, can he expand his plans.

"That will certainly enable me doing further investments in Afghanistan - not only constructing my third floor; I might have further plans to establish other franchises of my hotel in rest of the provinces and provide chances of employment for the rest of Afghans in different provinces."

A lot of Afghans would cheer such sentiment. But, for the moment, they must wait.