SHARAN (PAN): During the ongoing registration campaign, 45,500 people have been issued with voter cards in southeastern Paktika province, election commission officials said on Tuesday.
Independent Election Commission (IEC) head for Paktika, Zarab Shah Aajaz, told Pajhwok Afghan News 21,000 of the voter card recipients were women. The registration drive ends on Nov. 11.
With support from mobile teams, he said, IEC staff had been able to issue fresh cards over the past 45 days to individuals who were left out of the registration process ahead of the previous elections.
A large number of women have been given new voter cards, according to Aajaz, who said 43 people were in the run for provincial council seats.
Seven of them failing to meet IEC conditions have been excluded from the preliminary list of candidates, leaving 36 in the race, including five women.
But the provincial council deputy chief, Niamatullah Khalid, claimed residents of several districts could not voter cards due to insecurity.
If security was not ensured in Dila, Gayan, and Mata Khan as volatile districts, residents would be unable to vote and candidates would not hit the campaign trail, he warned.
Khalid explained the security was better in the areas where the Afghan Local Police (ALP) force had been deployed. Residents of those areas could join the registration process.
Din Mohammad, a dweller of Khairkot district, asked the authorities to stabilise insecure areas before next year’s elections. He said 20 percent of eligible voters would have received cards if security had been satisfactory.
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