Mohammad Gulab Mangal

Gulab Mangal
225px Gulab Mangal speaking at the ISAF headquarters in February 2010
Governor of Helmand
In office 22 March 2008 – 20 September 2012
Preceded by	Assadullah Wafa
Succeeded by	Mohammad Naeem
Governor of Laghman
In office 2006–2008
Preceded by	Shah Mahmood Safi
Governor of Paktika
In office 2004–2006
Preceded by	Muhammad Ali Jalali
Succeeded by	Mohammad Akram Khpalwak
Personal details
Born	1958 Gardēz, Paktia Province, Afghanistan
Nationality	Afghanistan
Religion	Muslim

Gulab Mangal (Pashto: ګلاب منګل‎) (born 1958), is the former Governor of Helmand, Afghanistan, and the former Governor of Laghman and Paktika. He also served as head of the Committee that drafted Afghanistan's most recent Constitution. Mangal was considered an effective governor by both diplomats and military officials in Afghanistan.

Life

Mangal was born in Laja Mangal, Paktia Province in Afghanistan, and belongs to the Mangal ethnic Pashtun tribe. He has a degree in literature from Kabul University.

A former member of the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan, Mangal served as a colonel in the Afghan army, and worked in the Ministries of Interior and Defence in the late 1970s, and later joined the insurrection fighting the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. After the American led invasion in 2001, he was appointed a Regional Coordinator of the Constitutional Loya Jirga in Paktia.

Mangal served as governor of Paktika Province from March 2004 until March 2006, and then as governor of Laghman Province. On March 22, 2008, he was made the governor of Helmand Province, while former Interior Ministry spokesman Lutfullah Mashal replaced him in Laghman.

When appointed governor of Helmand, he was said to be “one of the most accomplished governors to have served Afghanistan since 2001”. The Washington Post attributes Mangal′s popularity in Helmand to his appointing competent district leaders and focusing on delivering basic services to the population, who also regard him as willing to stand up to the corrupt government in Kabul. Further, Mangal, whom the New York Times calls “ardently anti-opium”, succeeded in cutting back opium cultivation in Helmand by 33 percent in 2009. Mangal's subsidised wheat seed programme, giving an alternative to poppy crops, is reported to have reached 40,000 farmers.

Attempts on his life

According to the New York Times, Mangal has faced at least four attempts on his life. The British tabloid the Sun reports that Mangal, whose son has been granted asylum in the UK, has survived more than a dozen assassination attempts and “lives in a heavily-fortified compound, lined with razor wire and blast-proof walls”, protected by British troops, and “goes out in disguise, shadowed by 15 bodyguards”.

In October 2006, Mangal′s convoy was struck by a bomb attack east of Kabul, for which the Taliban claimed responsibility, narrowly missing him, killing one provincial official.

In May 2008, while flying into Musa Qala with a British escort to dedicate a new mosque, the CH-47 Chinook helicopter in which he was flying was hit by rocket fire.

In February 2009, two U.S. soldiers who were part of a convoy of coalition troops accompanying Mangal to a village where he intended to talk to residents about alternatives to opium farming were killed along with three Afghans, including a police official, while trying to disable a roadside bomb.

In April 2010, three Italian citizens and six Afghans who worked at a hospital run by the Italian charity Emergency in the capital of Helmand Province, Lashkar Gah were detained, suspected of having planned suicide attacks. According to Mangal, he was the target of the planned attacks that would have killed many more people as well. Afghan authorities claimed the detainees later confessed, but the Taliban denied hiring any foreign aid workers, and they were later released without charges. The hospital staff had become unpopular with local officials, as they had a reputation for treating wounded Taliban fighters.

Wikileaks cables

In the WikiLeaks cables released in 2010, Mangal was cited as one of the officials in Afghanistan who criticised the British. According to U.S. cables of January 2009, Mangal accused the British of doing too little to interact with the local community, telling a U.S. team led by Vice-President Joe Biden that he did not “have anything against them (the British) but they must leave their bases and engage with the people.” As reported by the New York Times, the Wikileaks cables confirm that Mangal is considered an effective governor by foreign diplomats, and that he only kept his job as governor in Helmand Province thanks to “a concerted effort by the British, backed up by NATO allies”, when President Hamid Karzai wanted to replace him with a “tribal power broker with unsavory connections”.

See also

• Helmand Provincial Reconstruction Team

External links

Political offices
Preceded by Muhammad Ali Jalali	Governor of Paktika Province, Afghanistan 2004–2006	Succeeded by Akram Khpalwak
Preceded by Shah Mahmood Safi	Governor of Laghman Province, Afghanistan 2006–2008	Succeeded by Lutfullah Mashal
Preceded by Assadullah Wafa	Governor of Helmand Province, Afghanistan 2008-2012	Succeeded by Naeem Baloch