Kabul, September 08: Expressing serious concerns over the allegations of ballot box stuffing, voter intimidation and other fraud coming from all corners of Afghanistan, the UN and the US have called for a probe into last month’s Presidential Elections.
An Associated Press examination of returns shows what officials said Monday appear to be highly suspicious — and improbable — results.
Stations across Afghanistan’s south gave Karzai 200, 250 or 500 votes, according to figures compiled by the Independent Election Commission. Observers say these neatly rounded numbers show patterns of fraud consistent with allegations that large-scale vote rigging took place in dangerous regions that observers couldn’t reach.
A senior Western diplomat alleged Monday that a majority of the votes in three provinces — Kandahar, Paktika and Khost — are fraudulent. Partial returns from each of those provinces heavily favor Karzai. The diplomat spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of his work.
At the Zoor District Center in Paktika province, Karzai got 300, 250, 200 and 200 votes at four of the center’s six polling stations. As of Monday, the votes were still listed as part of the overall tally.
A Western elections expert in Kabul called such returns “illogical.” He also spoke on condition he wasn’t identified because of the nature of his work.
Afghan and international officials had predicted that vote fraud would occur, but hoped the election would be credible overall. Instead, the scale of the accusations and the questionable returns has thrown the ballot process in doubt.
The Western diplomat, one of Kabul’s power brokers, said that several people had advised Karzai before the election “not to pull a Nixon. That is, don’t steal an election you’ve already won.”
The elections expert, meanwhile, said many of the suspicious results came from voting stations that didn’t exist, supposedly located in remote parts of the country that Afghan tribal chiefs knew observers couldn’t reach and where security forces would not be posted.
He said there were likely as many as 800 such fake polling sites.
Another expert here conceded the credibility of the election is in question.
“The amount of allegations indicate that there has been massive fraud, but we need to wait for the Election Complaints Commission to do its investigations,” said Haroun Mir, the director of Afghanistan’s Center for Research and Policy Studies.
A U.S. Embassy spokeswoman, Caitlin Hayden, said Monday that the U.S. is looking for election officials to count all votes and then “exclude all fraudulent votes.”
“Anything less than rigorous vetting would call into question the credibility of the announced results,” she said. “A legitimate electoral process is vital to the ability of the international community to partner with a newly elected Afghan government.”
–Agencies