Ms. Fawzia Koofi, a Selfless Leader, a Modern Thinker, Poet,a kind mother, an articulated teacher and a Linguist
Darwaz, a district , where she learned that villagers are caught between many different problems. full story
Fawzia Koofi’s Challenging Trip
Fawzia Koofi, Deputy Speaker of the Lower House of the National Assembly of Afghanistan, traveled to remote district of Badakhshan province in northern part of the country on December 27. full story
Bush guest grateful for U.S. commitment
Fawzia Koofi, the veiled woman shown repeatedly at first lady Laura Bush's right elbow during the State of the Union, does not care about her newfound celebrity or that President Bush did not recognize her by name in his address Tuesday. full story
Widespread corruption plagues Afghan government: officials
Jan 31, 2009
Corroborating the allegations is tricky, since such illicit dealings don't leave a paper trail. But it's largely taken as a given in Afghanistan that every position of power - from the lowliest job in the civil service straight up to provincial governorships and cabinet posts - is available for the right price. "It's an auction," said Fawzia Koofi, an Afghan parliamentarian from the skillet-shaped province of Badakhshan full story
SUPPORT COMMITTEE FOR FAWZIA KOOFI
US Pres. Obama's Message in Celebration of Nowruz
February 24, 2009
Support Committee For Fawzia Koofi is proud to announce that Ms. Fawzia Koofi has been selected as the "Young Global Leader" of 2009. full story
Fawzia Koofi Honored
News and Discussion
This page was last updated: June 7, 2011
By Lina Haidari
Here she comes,
A legend of a woman, riding the horse of destiny with the speed of fate on paths of eternity.
Here she comes,
Fawzia Koofi on CNN in ''Afghanistan 'rape' law puts women's rights front and center
For Koofi, all Taliban are the same
By Sig Christenson
Dec 10, 09 01:25 PM
Fawzia Koofi recently returned from hajj, the fabled pilgrimage to Mecca, virtually glowing from the trip. When we met Koofi, a minister in Afghanistan's parliament, she sported a blue and yellow scarf over her head. A cleric in Mecca told her that after hajj, she should cover her hair, showing only her face. But that wouldn't be Koofi, one of 91 women in Afghanistan's parliament, the first female deputy speaker of its lower house and no pushover for anyone — including President Hamid Karzai, with whom she stands in a big color photo on her wall. Once a supporter, now she opposes him, calling him a man surrounded by people she says have no real love for — or belief in — a democratic government
Edward A. Ornelas/Express-News
-A photo of Koofi with President Hamid Karzai hangs in her home. She used to support him, but now she says he's surrounded by people who don't believe in democracy.
Koofi wouldn't cover her hair simply because she had made the pilgrimage that every Muslim is expected to make at least once. Doing something so dramatic, she said, had to come from the heart. No man, quite obviously, is telling her what to do.
So she lets her hair down, so to speak. There's a hint of the old and the new in her pose.
Sitting confidently in a chair that could double for a small throne, one that is slightly higher than the ornate furniture that a reporter, photographer and interpreter relax in on a recent Sunday evening at her home in Kabul, it's clear that Koofi is a liberated woman.
There aren't many like her in this country. Koofi speaks excellent English. When the acting minister of tribal affairs comes by for a visit, she is the one that holds forth, making small hand gestures, smiling and laughing. Sometimes she clutches the scarf. Asadullah Khaliz, a Karzai confidant who shows the journalists iPhone photos of the president gingerly riding a bicycle, spends a lot of his time listening.
Edward A. Ornelas/Express-News
Fawzia Koofi, at her home in Kabul, is one of 91 women in the Afghan parliament.
This is Koofi's world — a place of, by and for men, yet Khaliz would appear to be the supplicant. It isn't just because Koofi has a Web site, http://www.fawziakoofi.org, or that it starts off with this brief introduction: "Ms. Fawzia Koofi, a Selfless Leader, a Modern Thinker, Poet, a kind mother, an articulated teacher and a Linguist."
Get that again? Ms.?
In case you miss it, she makes the point in with a simple comment.
"We have much participation of women in Afghanistan politics," says Koofi, a representative of Badakhshan province in northern Afghanistan. "Yet 86 percent of the women are illiterate. I and the women who come before you are not typical of women in our country."
Koofi is as much a symbol of the democratic Afghanistan as she is one of the country's emerging leaders. She is widowed, her husband and father both victims of war.
Like my mom after our father's death, she is raising kids and keeping a roof over their heads. The role of traditional housewife has been jettisoned for that of provider, and Koofi appears to have done well in that regard. The roof that she puts over this house is fancier than the one I grew up in after Dad's passing, and it comes complete with a pair of bodyguards who stand at her side in the living room. Another security man paces outside on a dark, chilled street, armed with an AK-47, as we leave later that night.
Edward A. Ornelas/Express-News
Koofi is raising daughters Shaharzad, 11 (left) and Shuhra, 10, alone, her husband a victim of the war.
One of her daughters, Shuhra, 10, comes into the room and could double for a girl the same age in New York or Houston. She leans into her mother's chair, chewing gum and blowing bubbles, seemingly oblivious to the small, distinguished crowd in her home.
Later, another daughter, Shaharzad, 11, enters the room.
They listen as the conversation continues.
For Koofi, all Taliban are the same.
"It is very difficult to differentiate moderate Taliban from the hard-core. They are opposed to the Afghanistan constitution, they are opposed to women's rights," she said in English. "If you want to talk with an ideological group, it cannot happen because they want to set their own conditions."
Right now, Koofi tells the journalists, the Afghan government is weak. Even the Taliban refuse to negotiate with it "because they think this government doesn't have the support of the people, that it isn't legitimate."
But, she adds, "It is also true that the people are supportive of the process."
Afghanistan's people want to build a strong government based on the rule of law, Koofi said. That involves creating a more equitable judicial and legislative system, improving schools and the economy, and helping children survive. Many, these days, do not.
Build this world and the people will come. They'll support the government.
Occasionally pointed, Koofi can be the quintessential politician. A common accusation made here is that Karzai and other principal political leaders are corrupt to the bone.
Is that true? And what does that mean to the American soldiers fighting and dying here, to their families back home and the taxpayers bankrolling this war and her government?
"The point is that the whole country is favoring corruption. Either you need to sacrifice yourself or be corrupt," she said, explaining that everyone from peasants to politicians are on the take, that the sole difference is in the amount of money being exchanged.
"The system is favoring corruption."
It's a nice, vague answer that doesn't take Karzai to task — if that is what she has in mind. You see senators and congressmen give similar answers on the Sunday talk shows.
Koofi, who has been on CNN, probably has that part of her act down. She says as much.
"I feel like I am an actress," she laughs, adding that she's been interviewed by media ranging from ABC and the BBC to Al Jazeera.
Pressed to talk more about Karzai, Koofi says, "He's a good man as a human being. He's very kind, nice, tries to help. But his politics doesn't reflect his personality. His politics is surrounded by a group of people who don't believe in democracy.
"They're corrupt," she adds. "They want to keep the president marginalized from the people. He needs to get out of the the palace. He needs to be the president of all Afghanistan."
