Afghanistan: Voters Cast Ballots Despite Attacks

Afghanistan’s long delayed parliamentary elections held on Saturday. Despite a series of deadly attacks and administrative chaos that spoiled the election the positive side was the large numbers of voters appeared with their brave spirits. They have waited in long queues to cast their ballots.
According to Afghan interior minister, Wais Barmak, nearly 200 attacks happened near polling stations or checkpoints resulting at least 28 people killed and scores more injured. Later another blast in Kabul killed at least three more.
Not only the attacks but there were administrative mismanagements also including faulty voting registers and issues with new equipment for biometric ID checks, to officials who failed to show up for the 7 am opening and attempts to pressurize voters.
Tawab Faizi, a volunteer monitoring the vote in western Herat city said, “People have been lining up to vote since 5 am or 6 am but the employees of the election commission didn’t arrive until after 8 am, Many people are angry here, they queued for two or three hours but they were told that they cannot vote because their names are not on the list. There are many irregularities.”
Faiza Ibrahimi, a radio presenter expresses the frustration stating, “In today’s Afghanistan there is no good choice, we can only select between bad and worse. I and some other women voted for bad candidates to prevent the worse candidates winning,”
The problems raised the outlooks of the election and the security worries that come with it dragging on far beyond Saturday. The government said any voting stations that had opened late would stay open into the evening, and those that had not opened their doors until after 1 pm would open again on Sunday.
> Alma Siddiqua