KABUL (Pajhwok): Independent Election Commission (IEC) on Thursday said discussions with election teams and their representatives were on about resuming the votes recount and audit process which stopped in seven provinces due to oppositions by some candidates.
Acting spokesman of IEC, Zabihullah Sadat told Pajhwok Afghan News that the votes audit and recount process of 1,274 polling stations in seven provinces has stopped.
He said that nine of these polling stations belonged to Panjshir, 234 to Faryab, 43 to Sar-i-Pul, 13 to Jawzjan, 712 to Baghlan and 276 to Badakhshan province.
The IEC tries hard to resolve this problem and seek people’s support for the votes audit and recount process in these provinces, he said.
“We are busy talking with representatives of election teams and tribal elders to convince them and resume votes audit and recount process and get close to the announcement of preliminary results of the election,” he said.
Preliminary results to face political problems
Free and Fair Election Foundation of Afghanistan (FFEFA) head, Yousuf Rashid said that these problems should be resolved during a meeting with presidential candidates in presence of election oversight and media representatives.
“Candidates still accuse each other and say police work in favor of a particular hopeful, if the IEC does not resolve this problem, preliminary results would face technical, political and legal issues,” he said.
Votes recount completes in 4,640 polling stations
IEC acting spokesman, Zabihullah Sadat on Wednesday said that the votes audit and recount process was completed in 17 provinces while it was ongoing in 10 other provinces.
He said that the process was completed in Farah, Kunduz, Herat, Logar, Kunar, Badghis, Zabul, Uruzgan, Laghman, Balkh, Maidan Wardak, Nimroz, Samangan, Daikundi, Ghor and Nuristan provinces.
Sadat said votes recount process had completed in 4,640 polling stations in the mentioned provinces.
On November 9, the IEC announced audit and recount of votes from 8,255 polling stations for separating fraudulent votes from clean ones, but the process faced opposition from a number of presidential candidates including Dr. Abdullah Abdullah, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and Rahmatullah Nabil.
The IEC on November 13 stopped the audit and recount process of votes due to criticisms from the candidates and said the announcement of preliminary results of the election would be delayed.
However, the commission on November 17 said that it resumed the audit and recount process of votes after consulting with candidates.
Presidential election held on September 28. Earlier the IEC had given October 19 the date for announcement of preliminary result while November 7 for announcement of final result of the presidential election.
But due to some technical issues and problems during separation of clean and fraudulent votes, the IEC could not announce the result on its due date.
On October 27, the IEC said that primary result of the presidential election would be announced on November 14, but the commission again delayed the date for an indefinite of time.
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