Pir Mohammad Molazehi – Expert on Indian Subcontinent

Therefore, a coalition called the National Front for Salvation of Afghanistan was formed to pursue a united policy against these disagreements. This front includes individuals within the establishment such as General Abdul Rashid Dostum, Salahuddin Rabbani, Mohammad Mohaqiq and Atta Mohammad Noor. These politicians met in Turkey and decided to form a united front ahead of the elections and they did the same. Members of the Afghan salvation front had a major objection to the time of the elections and the terms for the selection of the Independent Election Commission (IEC) members by the President.

Currently, the Salvation Front has cast doubts on the health of the parliamentary elections and announced that their arguments have not been taken into consideration. The subsequent reactions of the Front also depend on how many of their candidates would be elected in the election. The Salvation Front believes the next problem is the procedure in which the names of those winning parliamentary seats are going to be announced.

In other words, the concept of elections in Afghanistan is different from what is common in the world. In fact, it is the collusion behind the curtain that sets out quotas that determines how members of the two National Unity parties coordinate their expectations with those of the other side and arrive at a consensus as to who should enter the parliament.

Therefore, the next assignment of the IEC is to keep the two factions satisfied so that they could bring their positions closer together and agree on the individuals that would take over parliamentary seats. That is to say that the votes cast at the voting stations do not count. What really counts are the views of these people at the IEC. In this regard, some people believe that the agreement between these two groups is not sufficient; they say the views of the representatives of the British, German and French embassies that have troops in Afghanistan are also important.

Therefore, all the groups are seeking to take an appropriate number of seats in the parliament, and this is a fundamental issue that will affect the future of democracy and sovereignty in Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, the Taliban created difficulties in the way of holding the elections to the extent possible. In areas under their control, they did not let voting to take place at all, thus depriving a part of the society of participating in the elections. In fact, about 8.8 million people registered for the elections but only about 4 million could vote. On the other hand, the process of voting also encountered problems, such as the list of people who had registered for Kabul was sent to Zabul. Another problem was that the electoral staff did not know how to work with biometric devices that had been allocated for fingerprinting.

Also, people who were assigned as ballot box collectors were late at the venue, so the disorder in the election was quite evident; some even suspect that the disorder could have been orchestrated. Of course, experts who are familiar with the conditions in Afghanistan believe that the confusion was not orchestrated and that the outbreak of such problems was natural.

In fact, very difficult conditions prevailed over Afghanistan in the two days of the elections and the Taliban assassinated 10 electoral candidates and carried out bombings as well. Despite all this, there was a high turnout, especially by young people and women at the ballot boxes. This shows the strong resolve of the voters to overcome the difficult conditions.

Along with these problems, one must take into account the fact that the political scene of Afghanistan is what we currently observe and the elections were held under these conditions. But the most important thing during the recent parliamentary elections was that for the first time since 2001, Afghans themselves held the elections and international forces and the United Nations did not interfere. Therefore, the Afghans can eliminate the weaknesses of their first electoral experience and prepare for the presidential election next year.