HELMAND GOVERNOR SENT TO PARLIAMENT; REPLACED BY

C O N F I D E N T I A L KABUL 005038 SIPDIS STATE FOR SA/FO AMBASSADOR QUINN, S/CT, SA/A NSC FOR AHARRIMAN, KAMEND CENTCOM FOR POLAD, CG CFA-A, CG CJTF-76 USAID FOR AID/ANE, AID/DCHA/DG E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/03/2015 TAGS: PGOV PREL PINR KDEM AF SUBJECT: HELMAND GOVERNOR SENT TO PARLIAMENT; REPLACED BY SENIOR NSC ADVISOR REF: KABUL 5010 Classified By: ACTING POL COUNSELOR MARY TOWNSWICK FOR REASONS 1.4 (B) AND (D) ¶1. (U) President Karzai has named Engineer Mohammad Daoud, currently holding a senior position at the National Security Council, as the new Governor of Helmand Province. Per reftel, outgoing Governor Mullah Shir Mohammad Akhund is leaving Helmand to take a seat in the Meshrano Jirga (MJ, Upper House of Parliament). BIO INFORMATION -------------- ¶2. (SBU) Engineer Mohammad Daoud was born in 1956 in Helmand Province. He received his B.Sc. in civil engineering from Kabul Polytechnic in 1976 and later, in 1982, began his service as a site engineer and chief engineer in the building department of the Minister of Defense in Kabul. After three years at the MOD, Daoud left Kabul to become a refugee in Pakistan, where he worked for the next ten years with UN humanitarian agencies assisting Afghan refugees based in Pakistan's Baluchistan Province. ¶3. (SBU) In 1995, Daoud joined an Afghan NGO working in reconstruction and relief activities in SW Afghanistan. In 1996 he was appointed coordinator of the SW Afghanistan and Baluchistan Association for Coordination (SWABAC),a national and international NGO coordination body. He returned to Kabul in 2002 to join the Office of the National Security Council (NSC),first working as Director of Administration/Finance and later as Director of Policy and Oversight. Daoud remained at the NSC, working as the focal point for the PRT (Taliban/HiG reconciliation) program and detainee-related issues in the ONSC until being appointed by President Karzai as Governor of Helmand on December 12. ¶4. (C) COMMENT: Embassy interlocutors have found Daoud to be responsive and competent. His English, although measured and deliberate, is quite fluent. While he will doubtless be a major improvement over the outgoing governor, Helmand's gain will be the NSC's loss. This appointment clearly shows President Karzai's intention to put one of his own people in a province that is important for both security and counternarcotics terms. END COMMENT. NEUMANN