During his inauguration speech, Karzai pledged to "end the culture of impunity and violation of law and bring to justice those involved in spreading corruption and abuse" and make it "obligatory for senior government officials to identify the sources of their assets and to declare their properties in a transparent manner".

[1] Western officials publicly said his lineup of minister candidates would be a first vital test to show whether he was serious about combating corruption, which undermined his government's credibility and fed the Taliban insurgency.

[2] So Karzai was under pressure to exclude ineffective or corrupt officials, but at the same time powerful Afghans who helped deliver his re-election were promised or demanding positions, including the Uzbek warlord, Abdul Rashid Dostum.

The finance, justice, education, water and energy, women's affairs, agriculture, counter-narcotics and telecommunication ministers were renamed.

[11][12][13] The most important portfolios were given a U.S. approval by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, when she attended Karzai's inauguration in November 2009.

Although only one warlord, Ismail Khan, was offered a cabinet position, the list proposed by Karzai mirrored the fact that he had to give in to demands of the main power-brokers that had helped him secure his re-election.

Seyyed Mohammad Amin Fatemi, the incumbent minister for public health, is affiliated with the Nejat-e Melli of Sibghatullah Mojaddedi.

Finally, the Jombesh-e Melli, of strongman Abdul Rashid Dostum has two high-ranking members on the list with the deputy head of the party, Mohammad Ismail Munshi, named as Minister of Labour and Social Affairs and Dr. Mohammadullah Batash, a former Secretary of the Jombesh General Council as Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation.

[14] Shortly before Karzai presented his list of nominees, the Wolesi Jirga, the Lower House of the Afghan Parliament, after three days of debating, decided against giving trust vote to ministers with dual citizenship.

By presenting his list of candidates, Karzai asked the parliament to create a new Ministry for Martyred and Disabled Affairs, for which he named Taj Ali Saber, a member of the Khost Provincial council, as minister.

[20][21][22][23] The rules of the wolesi jirga prevented nominees from being put forward again and since the parliament was scheduled to begin a 45-day winter vacation 3 days later, it seemed that Karzai would have to go into the international conference of Afghanistan with a largely incomplete cabinet.

[25][26][27] The parliament decided to take a short break of three days and demanded Karzai to come up with a list of names, including a candidate for the post of Foreign Affairs.

Seven other incumbent ministers were rejected, most notable the only woman on the list, Hosn Banu Ghazanfar, and the powerful warlord Ismail Khan.

[30] This time, a candidate for the foreign ministry had been named, by putting forward the candidacy of Zalmai Rassoul, then the head of the national security agency.

He had to leave his post of Governor of Khost due to allegations of corruption and also served as member of Karzai's re-election campaign team.

With Zalmai Rassoul confirmed, Afghanistan received a new and Minister of Foreign Affairs, who was close to Karzai, just before the start of the important London Conference.

That was also the case for Habibullah Ghaleb, a member of the Afghan National Liberation Front of former president Sibghatullah Mojaddedi, who was confirmed as Minister of Justice.

Engineer Abdul Rahim, a senior member of the Jamiat-e Islami and close associate to former President Burhanuddin Rabbani did not receive enough votes to become the minister of refugees.

His nephew, Jarullah Mansouri, also a member of Jamiat but said to be closer to Vice-president Mohammad Faheem, did however gather enough votes and was approved as minister of Rural Rehabilitation and Development.

[33] Karzai decided not to push for a third list before the international conference to fill the vacant positions, but instead to keep some of the candidates on as 'acting ministers' who were leading their ministry without official approval of Parliament.

The MPs stated that they wouldn't approve next year's budget until President Karzai nominated the remaining Cabinet Ministers.

[41] The two ministers that were considered heavyweights in the cabinet were unable to answer questions to the satisfaction of the Parliament and lost a subsequent vote of confidence.

[41] Since President Karzai had also sacked the head of the National Directorate of Security (NDS), in September 2012 he came up with a list of new names for three of the major power positions.

Haji Din Muhammad, former governor of Nangarhar and Kabul Province, and Karzai's 2009 campaign manager, was named as Minister of Tribes and Borders.

Eleven ministers were summoned to parliament because the MPs believed, based on a report by the Supreme Audit Office, that they had spent less than half of the development budgets allocated to them.

Daudzai had been chief of staff to Karzai and ambassador to Iran and then Pakistan and had declared his “possible” intention to run in the 2014 Presidential election.

[49] In March 2014, at the age of 57, vice president Mohammad Fahim died of a heart attack, just a few months before his term would end.