The Independent Election Commission (IEC) has not been able to announce the preliminary results of the presidential election that was held over two months ago on September 28 after several delays. While electoral reforms were the main commitment of the power-sharing agreement of the National Unity Government for which the parliamentary election was also postponed for about four years, almost all the problems of the parliamentary election recurred in the previous presidential election. Due to those very problems, IEC has not yet announced the initial results, and Afghan people still don’t know who will be their next president.
The current uncertain political situation and unfolding electoral crisis can have grave consequences for Afghanistan, especially now as the country is at a crossroads. Given the delicacy of the situation, IEC needs to take the initiative and pave the way for the announcement of the election result by convincing the presidential tickets which have boycotted the vote recount and audit process. As the handler of the national democratic process, the election commission must be capable of earning the trust of all stakeholders. It is less likely to have a successful election when there is a serious trust deficit between the election commission and the stakeholders. Thus, the electoral institutions, particularly the IEC, must bring the electoral tickets around by ensuring transparency in the election results that the basis for their work is the applicable laws, regulations, and procedures. When compliant with its principles, the commission should have no fear about the repercussions of its decisions as it is the only entity authorized to make decisions on the announcement of results and the winner and loser of the election.
The electoral teams, who have boycotted the vote recounting process, must make legal demands that can contribute to electoral transparency, not ones that are solely meant to revolve on their victory. The delay in annoucement of election results has badly affected the private sector as well as governance, and the damage caused to people can further increase if the situation continues as is.