Afghanistan Times
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KABUL: An eccentrically prolonged investigation of electoral fraud has set off bedlam in the critical contest for presidency for months, pushing trust in election commissions to the lowest ebbs and stoking doubts about the legitimacy of the eventual outcome.
Election Complaints Commission has not so far sent its decision on 300,000 contentious ballots – a week-long delay, though the commission had announced earlier last week that it had concluded the adjudication of all complaints and due to hand them to the independent election commission for implementation. The commission’s decision is a special recount of all 137,000 suspicious ballots if 35% of ballots don’t qualify valid vote criteria during the partial audit.
Another controversy emerged last week after members of the complaints commission were caught in a rift over handover of decisions to the central election commission.
This is as the election commission has said that it will announce its decision in regard with audit and recount of ballots as soon as it receives the complaints panel’s decision.
This is amid calls for transparency and lawfulness of the commission’s decision-makings and resistance against bullying politicians who seek to turn the prickly situation to their favor.
Amid the commissions’ uncertainty, Abdullah Abdullah had recently floated possibility of a runoff voting and that the commissions may kill time to announce the election outcome.
