Despite the fact that Afghanistan has suffered so much thanks to electoral disputes, the country is yet to have electoral institutions fully trusted and supported by the citizens. The National Unity Government delayed the parliamentary election for over four years, and the presidential election twice under the ploy of electoral reforms, but neither the electoral system nor the electoral commissions were overhauled to restore public trust in the election process. The last parliamentary and presidential polls were riddled with unprecedented problems. The same irregularities and technical issues such as problems with the voter lists, equipment malfunctions and violations of election timeline that occurred in last year’s Wolesi Jirga election repeated in the last month’s presidential election.
Since the announcement of the election timeline, the Independent Election Commission (IEC) kept insisting that it would remain committed to the timeline, but unfortunately that did not happen. IEC could not announce the preliminary election results on time. Election officials should have announced a realistic and feasible timeline considering their existing resources and capacity. They were aware of at least the problems and challenges of previous election, and therefore should have learned a lesson. The election commission has a weak management and is not able to even set another date for the announcement of the preliminary results because the commissioners are not sure when all the votes will be counted and transferred to their main server.
It is logical to postpone the results in order to ensure transparency, but there has to be assurances that the delay will really contribute to transparency in the results. If the outcome of election gets delayed time and again and no measures are taken for transparency, it will only slide the country into yet another electoral crisis. IEC must not overlook the menace, and should save the country, which has already been grappling with various challenges, from another long-running election dispute in the current critical situation by acting responsibly. There is no doubt that Afghan people want transparent election results because it can help revive trust in the democratic process; however, any delay for transparency should not touch off another political crisis as the country and people cannot afford it.
