Gul Agha Sherzai (; born 1954), also known as Mohammad Shafiq, He previously served as Governor of Kandahar province, in the early 1990s and from 2001 until 2003. In October 2013, Sherzai resigned from his post as governor and formally announced himself as a candidate for Afghanistan's 2014 Presidential Election, and served as the minister of border and tribal affairs until the Taliban captured Afghanistan again in 2021.

After the collapse of the PDPA government in 1992, Sherzai served as Governor of Kandahar.

According to Matthieu Aikins, writing in Harper's Magazine Karzai appointed a Mullah Naqib to the Governorship of Kandarhar.

In January 2009, an article by Ahmad Majidyar of the American Enterprise Institute included Sherzai on a list of fifteen possible candidates in the 2009 Afghan Presidential election. In May 2009, he announced that he would not be a candidate. Nevertheless, his name was on an August 2009 ballot, and preliminary results placed him 17th in a field of 38.

Sherzai's brother is Abdul Raziq Sherzai, a commander who captured Kandahar airfield in 2001-02 and was subsequently made the Kandahar wing commander of the Afghan Air Force.

On October 2, 2013, Sherzai resigned from his post as Governor of Nangarhar Province and formally announced himself as a candidate for Afghanistan's 2014 Presidential Election.

Since 2021, Sherzai pledged allegiance to the Taliban government and he had also congratulated their victory in the American War in Afghanistan after they took over Kabul.

References

  • BBC News - Afghanistan's Powerbrokers (Gul Agha Sherzai)
  • Profile: Gul Agha Sherzai