The turnout
A recent article reports: “Afghanistan’s Independent Election Commission said data from just over half the country’s polling stations showed around 1.1 million people had voted for one of the more than a dozen candidates vying to rule the war-torn country, including the incumbent president, Ashraf Ghani.If the figures are consistent with the booths yet to report it would indicate that less than a quarter of the country’s 9.6 million registered voters cast their ballot on Saturday, a steep decline from the approximately 60% of eligible voters who participated in the 2004 polls. An Afghan official told Reuters the turnout figure could be as low as 20%. This would be the lowest level since the 2001 US-led invasion.”
Taliban threatened polling and rallies
A considerable amount of the decline may have resulted from Taliban actual and threatened attacks on rallies and on polling.
Many registered voters no doubt decided it was safer to stay home. However, there are also allegations of fraud. No doubt there will be problems selling the validity of the vote to the public. The Taliban considers the Afghan government to be a puppet of the US and refuses to negotiate with it.
As a recent article notes: “… every major election since the US takeover has been heavily contested, with election commissions fighting over the counts and recounts. Indeed, the 2014 election, the most recent, ended with the US declaring both candidates winners and creating a whole second office for the other candidate.”
If there is no decisive winner there will be a runoff vote
The flaws in the weekend election mirror those of 2014: “Then, like now, the leading rivals for president were Ashraf Ghani and Abdullah Abdullah; then, like now, allegations of widespread fraud and a deeply flawed and sloppy election process swirled over the voting; then, like now, violent attacks marred voting, even forcing the closure of some polls. This time roughly 468 polling centers were not opened because it wasn’t possible to secure them against Taliban attacks.”
The two main candidates are the present president Ghani and Abdullah Abdullah who shared power with him. If neither wins decisively there will be a runoff election between the two later. There was a deal in principle between the Taliban and the US but it was rejected by Trump on September 7th so the elections went ahead. However, an election that had a low turnout and already faces fraud allegations is hardly likely to provide any grounds for optimism as far as restarting peace talks is concerned. If the vote is conteststed there could even be violence between supporters of the two main candidates.
Abdullah Abdullah has claimed he has won even before any official results. This itself could cause conflict.
