Former Afghan Minister: Taliban Faces Collapse Over Public Divide

DID Press: Former Afghan Minister of Information and Culture Abdul Bari Jahani has warned that the Taliban’s continued confrontation with the aspirations and values of the Afghan people will ultimately lead to the group’s downfall, arguing that national symbols cannot be erased from the country’s collective identity.

Speaking on Afghanistan’s National Flag Day, Jahani said the Taliban may have removed the country’s tricolor flag from official institutions, but it remains a powerful symbol for Afghans both inside the country and across the diaspora.

“The Taliban may have taken the flag down in Afghanistan, but it is still alive among Afghans abroad and in the hearts of the people,” he said.

Jahani criticized the Taliban for abolishing the country’s former constitution, national anthem, and other republican-era state symbols, describing the movement as an ideological system that disregards alternative views and governs solely according to its own doctrine.

He argued that the Taliban’s policies are incompatible with the aspirations of the Afghan people as well as with contemporary educational and social systems across the broader Islamic world, warning that this disconnect poses a serious challenge to the group’s long-term rule.

“The Taliban will inevitably fall because it stands completely against the wishes and aspirations of the Afghan people,” Jahani said.

Abdul Bari Jahani served as Afghanistan’s Minister of Information and Culture between 2015 and 2016 and is the author of the lyrics of the former national anthem of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan.