AFGHANISTAN: INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY QUIET AS INDEPENDENT ELECTION COMMISSION FLOUTS LAW

Eurasia Insight:
October 26, 2009

Although Afghanistan's key political players have acknowledged the need for a second round of presidential voting, a crisis of legitimacy continues to grip the electoral process, with the Independent Election Commission (IEC) disregarding some decisions issued by the Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC).

The ECC is the ultimate authority on electoral irregularities, while the IEC is a government-appointed body responsible for the holding of elections and, most importantly, the counting of the ballots cast. Three out of five ECC members are appointed by the United Nations, while members of the IEC are appointees of incumbent President Hamid Karzai, a fact that has raised questions about the electoral body's independence.

Karzai's challenger in the looming presidential run-off, Dr. Abdullah Abdullah, is highly critical of the IEC's performance so far in the election process. On October 26, Abdullah demanded that the agency's chairman, former Karzai advisor Azizullah Ludin, be removed before the November 7 run-off. "One of our conditions is the immediate removal of Ludin because he has no credibility before the people," Abdullah said in widely distributed comments.

In an interview October 25 with Fox News Sunday, Abdullah seemed to hold out the possibility that he would boycott the runoff unless substantive changes in the electoral format, the ballot-counting process in particular, were implemented. "It will be a very serious situation if we are up against the same sorts of conditions that we went through in the first round elections," Abdullah said during the interview.

Preliminary IEC election figures put Karzai over the 50-percent threshold needed to avoid a second-round of voting. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. But after widespread irregularities came to light, pressure mounted on the ECC to investigate discrepancies. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. The ECC eventually threw out the results from enough electoral districts that Karzai's share of the vote fell beneath the 50-percent mark.

According to Democracy International, an independent international observer group, by the established ECC criterion, Karzai would have received 48.29 percent of the vote with 31.54 percent going to his closest challenger, Abdullah.

Under established guidelines, the ECC's findings should have been binding on all parties involved in the presidential election. But that has not been the case in practice. The IEC has not implemented all ECC decisions, issuing a statement on October 20 that noted "some reservations regarding the decisions of the Electoral Complaints Commission."

When the IEC issued its final vote tally on October 20, Karzai had 49.67 percent of the vote, roughly 1.5 percent higher than estimates based on ECC criteria. Ludin, the IEC chairman, has consistently refused to provide any explanation about the IEC's reservations with the ECC report. Ludin has likewise declined to explain how the IEC arrived at its final tally.

The only sure thing is that somewhere between the release of the ECC's report on irregularities and the hard political bargaining that resulted in Karzai accepting a second round of polling, the IEC came up with a different, and higher vote total for the frontrunner.

While some observers feel the change in the tally is insignificant, especially since the principle of a second round has been accepted, others suggest that the alteration damages the ECC as a mechanism for redressing complaints about electoral fraud. "This [fraud] is the real issue today, not the fact that a second round has been accepted," said a Western official closely associated with the electoral process who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The IEC's action appears to set a dangerous precedent, under which the ECC's decisions are opened up to interpretation. This could have a significant impact on the results of provincial council elections, which were held August 20 in conjunction with the presidential poll. The provincial council results are expected to be certified in the coming days, and the IEC would seem to have carved out for itself arbitrary authority to determine some close and disputed races.

Finding itself embroiled in an intense political controversy, the ECC has stepped back from the public arena. It now eschews regular press briefings and, instead, has taken to issuing opaque statements. In a bid to assert its authority, the ECC issued a statement on October 22 (two days after the final results were announced), emphasizing that the IEC was obliged to implement the ECC decisions before certifying the final results.

"Under the electoral law, the decisions of the ECC are final and binding. Once the IEC has complied with all the terms of its decisions it may proceed with the certification of the results," the ECC said. The IEC has not responded to the ECC statement.

The ECC has not attempted to publicize the IEC's failure to follow procedure. But several ECC officials working remain irate over the IEC's willful disregard of the law. Speaking to EurasiaNet on condition of anonymity, ECC officials expressed anger with the international community for not calling the IEC on its transgression. ECC decisions need to be implemented, they explain, to strengthen the commitment of Afghans to the rule of law.

For the moment, however, political expediency appears to be taking precedence over principle. In its eagerness to ensure a second-round of voting, the international community seems to be willing to ignore the fact that the rule of law is being flouted.


Editor's Note: Aunohita Mojumdar is an Indian freelance journalist based in Kabul. She has reported on the South Asian region for the past 19 years.