Afghan election results coming out informally amid fraud charges
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The unofficial results of Afghanistan's complex presidential election have begun coming out slowly amid charges of fraud and being rigged.
Reports from across the provinces collected from local administrations, staff and officials with election commission at provincial levels have put the sitting Hamid Karzai and his main challenger Abdullah Abdullah in lead.
Based on a local official in Panjshir province, the main voting base of Abdullah, he secured 87 percent of out of over 110,000 voters; while incumbent Karzai and Ramazan Bashardost by wining 6 percent and 2 percent secured the second and third positions.
In the neighbouring Parwan province, according to a local official, Abdullah has bagged 126,102 votes out of over 200,000 votes and Karzai and Bashardost by wining 40,000 votes and 700 votes have stood the second and third ranks.
The index has been confirmed by Fazal Sangcharaki, the chief spokesman for Abdullah.
However, Hajji Deen Muhammad the chief of Karzai's campaign office when approached did not make comment.
Meantime, in Faryab province, according to provincial governor Abdul Haq Shafaq, 80 percent out of 550,000 voters used their franchise.
In Faryab, according to Shafaq, the sitting Karzai secured first position while Abdullah and Bashardost stood at second and third.
The uncharge of election body in Sar-e-Pul province Aziz Ahmad Rasouli said that 100,000 out of some 300,000 eligible to vote used their franchise on the election day and the outcome put Karzai in first position while Abdullah and Bashardost are in second and third positions.
Director of election commission in Jauzjan province Amanullah Habibi without giving the number of voters said that Karzai had won first position followed by Abdullah and Bashardost.
Chief of election commission in the northeast Afghanistan Kawa Dashti said that Abdullah and Karzai are almost in equal positions in Kunduz, Takhar, Badakhshan and Baghlan provinces as in some constituency Abdullah is in lead while in other Karzai is in better place.
Reports from Kandahar, Zabul, Uruzgan, Uruzgan and Khost put Karzai in first position while in Helmand, Bamyan and other provinces almost put the sitting president and Abdullah in equal positions.
In the capital city Kabul, a private television channel Negah based on information collected from some voting centers put Karzai in first position, a report rejected by Abdullah's spokesman Fazal Sangcharaki as merely baseless propaganda.
However, Daud Ali Najafi, the Chief Electoral Officer of Afghanistan's Independent Election Commission (IEC) rejected the above results provided by other sources than IEC, saying Independent Election Commission is the only body that announces the official result of the election.
"Independent Election Commission is the authorized body to announce the outcome of the election and the partial results would be announced on Aug. 25,"Najafi told Xinhua.
He also confirmed that the results of voting from Panjshir and Parwan provinces had arrived to Kabul and added transporting the results from the whole country would be completed by Monday.
Some 17 million Afghans eligible to vote was supposed to use their franchise on Aug. 20 presidential election, but the turnout in comparison to the last election held in 2004 was as low as 40- 50 percent.
When Najafi's opinion was sought about the turnout, he said, it is difficult at this stage to say the turnout unless all the votes are counted.
The official final results of the complex election, according to Najafi would be announced on Sept. 17.
Possibly it would take more time to announce the final result of the Afghan presidential election as the counting goes through a complex process.
The results from polling stations first are taken to the provincial capital and from there to the national tally center in the capital city Kabul and the then IEC announces the outcome provincial by provincial which takes several days or weeks.
The IEC official made this announcement while Karzai's main challenger Abdullah on Sunday doubted the fairness of the election and told newsmen that he had lodged more than 100 complaints.
Meantime, director of the UN-backed Independent Electoral Complaint Commission Grant Kippen said Sunday that his entity had received 225 complaints since beginning voting on Aug. 20 which could affect the final result of the second direct presidential polls in the post-Taliban country.
Abdullah also described the president of IEC as a Karzai appointee and stressed that he had no faith in him to deal with the electoral process fairly.
Another challenger to Karzai, former Finance Minister Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai also filed dozens of complaints over irregularities on the voting day with Electoral Complaint Commission, said a press release issued by his office on Monday.
(Xinhua News Agency August 24, 2009)
