Afghan Leaders Miss Goal for Choosing Cabinet KABUL, Afghanistan - President Ashraf Ghani's honeymoon with the Afghan public is not over yet, but he has now officially broken his first campaign promise - to form a new government within 45 days after his inauguration. Some Western diplomats are worried that continued disagreements between Mr. Ghani and his election rival, Abdullah Abdullah, in forming a unity government could push completion of a cabinet to the end of the year or beyond. That is a troubling state of affairs after a protracted election that had already consumed most of the rest of the year. One diplomat thought that even seating a cabinet by year's end was optimistic. "By the end of which year?" he said, "Gregorian or Persian?" The Persian year, which Afghanistan uses, ends on March 20. "President Ghani is well aware that today's the 45th day, but he feels we need time and more thorough thinking before we finish it," his spokesman, Nazifullah Salarzai, said on Thursday. After a runoff presidential election on June 14 that was badly tainted by widespread fraud, the United States and the United Nations encouraged the two candidates to negotiate a national unity government, giving Mr. Ghani the presidency, but also giving Mr. Abdullah a new post known as chief executive. Agreeing on the structure of that government consumed nearly three months, and Mr. Ghani and Mr. Abdullah were inaugurated on Sept. 29, eight months after the election campaign began. Since then, followers of both leaders have taken pains to insist that the holdup in forming a new government has not been a result of disputes between them over who gets which cabinet ministries. By agreement, those are supposed to be divided "equitably" between their camps. "It's about education, qualifications, making sure there is no corruption," said Qamaruddin Shinwari, a Ghani supporter who was rumored to be in line as the next attorney general, which he denied. Talk about a long delay in forming the government is wrong, he said, adding: "That is only their personal view. We are very hopeful that we will have a qualified cabinet very soon. We are hopeful that it's within days. "Coming soon" was a term heard throughout the summer-long debate between the two camps over the composition of a unity government. By most accounts, agreement was reached mainly because many of the detailed decisions were deferred - and remain so. Both sides have agreed not to release any appointee names until they have the entire package of ministers, Supreme Court justices and other key positions agreed upon. "I think there are big internal disagreements within the two electoral teams," said Bashir Bezhan, a political analyst unaligned with either camp. So what they are doing now is killing time in order to find the right moment to make appointments and avoid disagreements from within their teams. Creating a chief executive position, and allowing Mr. Abdullah to effectively choose half the government, in turn made that many fewer jobs Mr. Ghani had to reward his supporters. And Mr. Abdullah's followers, convinced he was the true winner, were bitterly disappointed at their smaller share of government spoils. One of the more publicly discussed sticking points was the role of Ahmad Zia Massoud, a prominent supporter of Mr. Ghani who delivered many northern Tajiks to his side. Mr. Abdullah has been closely identified with Afghanistan's Tajik political base, and Mr. Ghani with Pashtuns. Mr. Ghani had reportedly agreed to give Mr. Massoud the position of chief executive in the new government, for instance, leaving him bitterly disappointed when Mr. Abdullah was given the post in the national unity government deal. The delay in forming a cabinet has left many government programs stalled, and Western donors as well as Afghan leaders are worried about losing ground on many initiatives at a critical time, as NATO prepares to end its combat role by the end of 2014. More immediately, Mr. Ghani has wasted no time in filling some key positions on his own staff, and for the most part, they show his determination to form a government of technocrats. For his spokesman, he hired away Mr. Salarzai from the United Nations mission here. For his personal chief of staff, he appointed a respected humanitarian activist, Abdul Salam Rahimi, who started the country's biggest Afghan aid group and later ran a nonprofit television network, Saba Media. Mr. Ghani restructured two duplicative bureaucracies within the presidential palace into one under Mr. Rahimi. Mr. Ghani appointed Mr. Massoud as his presidential envoy for good governance, putting him in charge of rooting out corruption. Mr. Ghani named the holdover minister of finance, Omar Zakhilwhel, as his economics adviser, and he made a legal scholar, Abdul Ali Mohammadi, his legal adviser. He also appointed a popular former interior minister, Hanif Atmar, who was fired by President Hamid Karzai, as his national security adviser. The lack of a new cabinet has hardly kept Mr. Ghani from governing. In addition to signing long-term security agreements with NATO and the United States almost immediately, allowing troops to remain here in 2015, Mr. Ghani moved swiftly to push the judiciary to act on the Kabul Bank case. An appeals court this week tripled the sentences against its two top executives, Sherkhan Farnood and Khalilullah Frozi, to 15 years in prison from five. Mr. Ghani also moved quickly to restructure the attorney general's office, and is planning to shift the country to a three-year budgeting cycle from a one-year cycle. His coming trip to Pakistan will be his third foreign trip, after China and Saudi Arabia, in the first 45 days of his term. All that activity has diverted some attention from the lack of a new government, while former ministers mostly remain in their jobs. Both sides remain upbeat. "I am very optimistic that they are working very hard on selecting the new cabinet," said Mirwais Yaseeni, an Abdullah aide. But he said he had no idea who any of the new ministers might be. Another Abdullah aide, Abdul Jabbar Shelgarai, said, "There is no big difference, just a difference in approach." Both thought the government would be formed soon. Mr. Ghani's new legal adviser, Mr. Mohammadi, also predicted a new cabinet soon, made up of "effective, professional, qualified members who act apolitically." The only thing he was sure of was that the new cabinet really would be new. "None of the current acting ministers will be included or part of the new cabinet - most probably none," Mr. Mohammadi said.