Early life and education
Sangin was born as the first son to Amirgul Gulshakhel, a tailor, on 6 June 1949 in the Urgun District of Paktika Province. Sangin attended primary school in Urgun and secondary school in Gardez, Paktia Province. He graduated from Afghanistan’s Telecommunications Training Center (TTC), and arrived in London in August 1969, where he studied for six years, obtaining an engineering degree in electronics and communications from South London College, London.
Sangin speaks Dari, Pashto, English and Swedish.
Career
He was an instructor at TTC from 1975 to 1978, and served as its rector from 1978 to 1980.
After the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979, Sangin sought asylum in Sweden in June 1980 and lived with his family in Malmoe, Sweden.
In 1982, Sangin joined Swedish Telecom. He worked for King Khaled International Airport in Saudi Arabia as a communications project team member from 1982 to 1985 and then, for the next five years, was involved in the design, development and implementation of mobile networks in Sweden. A founding member of Swedish Telecom International (now called Telia International), Sangin was a leader in obtaining international bids, winning 8 GSM licenses in Estonia, Latvia, Russia, Hungary, Italy, Namibia and India from 1990 to 2000 and he has held several senior-level management positions in the establishment of highly successful companies in each of these countries.
Returning to Afghanistan soon after 9/11, Sangin initially carried out training for AWCC and MCIT engineers. He headed the Ministry of Communications & Information Technology (MCIT)’ evaluation committee for a GSM license in 2002, and in February 2003, became Senior Advisor to the Minister of Communications & IT.
Sangin was appointed Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Afghan Telecom in July 2004. As CEO, he worked to build the Afghan Telecom organization by developing new processes and procedures and improving issues of interconnection.
Sangin was appointed as Minister of Communications & IT of I.R of Afghanistan in December 2004 and was in this post for 10 years till December 2014. During this period, under the visionary leadership of Mr. Sangin, there was tremendous progress in the Telecommunication sector. The telecom sector attracted the biggest Foreign Direct Investment totaling over $ 2 billion and contributed annual revenues to the treasury of over $200 million. The telecom sector created over 140,000 well-paid jobs. Telecom services coverage reached over 85% of the population and there were over 22 million phone users in the country. Broadband digital networks, DSL, 3G and Wimax were being implemented in major cities and reached more than 50% of population by end of 2014.
During Sangin’s tenure as Minister, most parts of the country as well as neighboring countries got connected via optical fibre networks.
Under Sangin’s leadership and hard work, despite huge challenges, a National Data Centre and an electron ID system were developed, and today electronic IDs are being issued to all citizens. This paves the way for future digital services and electronic governance.
A higher education Information and Communications Technology Institute was established which graduates 40-50 bachelor level young Afghans who plays vital role in the development of the country.
Sangin is the author of a book called “Me and Telecommunications” which was published in June 2021 in both official languages of Afghanistan Pashto and Dari.
Sangin developed highly profitable state-owned Afghan Telecom company and its mobile wing Salaam to be a leading provider of telecommunications services in Afghanistan.
As Minister of Communications and Information Technology, Sangin received Visionary of the Year 2006 Award from ICF, US and the prestigious Government Leadership Award, 2011 in Barcelona, Spain from the GSM Association.