KABUL (Pajhwok): The Independent Electoral Complaints Commission (IECC) head for northeastern Badakhshan province on Wednesday accused the commission’s central office in Kabul of being behind ‘doctored’ results from the Wolesi Jirga elections.
Hamid Sadat, IECC head in Badakhshan, alleged at a press conference in Kabul that results sent by the complaint’s body’s regional office were manipulated and documents forged at the main office before they were sent to the Independent Election Commission (IEC).
He said the IECC’s central office totally ignored decisions and results of its regional office in Badakhshan.
“The results we sent to the central office were in several pages and each page carried the signature of the secretary, but the results referred to the IEC carried only one signature at the last page which shows the results are doctored,” he said.
Sadat claimed the IECC had added votes to the tallies of a number of candidates, but after their involvement was exposed, three IECC commissioners asked the IEC to announce initial results of the Wolesi Jirga polls.
The IEC after announcing the initial results decided to recount votes of 263 polling sites and during the process around 400 votes of some of candidates were either invalidated or validated.
He asked the president and judiciary organs to investigate the issue and bring those involved to justice.
Saleh Mohammad Mominyar, IECC secretary in Badakhshan, about the alleged manipulation of results at the central IECC office, said: “We are accountable for all documents we had sent to the central office, but not for the documents sent by the central office to the IEC.”
A number of candidates in Kunar, Badakhshan and Sar-i-Pul provinces earlier this week shut the IECC office in Kabul in protest after their names were removed from the final list of winning candidates.
They criticized the IECC and said the commission made unjust and secret decisions about their fate. The candidates said the IECC should respond to their complaints.
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