Afghan vote enters second day after attacks, technical issues
KABUL: Afghanistan’s parliamentary elections entered a second day after delays caused by violence and technical issues, as a roadside bomb killed nearly a dozen civilians on Sunday, including several children.
Independent Elections Commission Chairman Abdul Badi Sayat said more than 3 million people out of 8.8 million registered voters cast their ballots on Saturday. The biggest turnout was in Kabul and the lowest in the southern Uruzgan province.
Polling on Sunday continues in 401 voting centres, including 45 in Kabul.the results will not be released before mid-november and final results will not be out until December.
The first parliamentary elections since 2010 are being held against a backdrop of near-daily attacks by the Taliban, who have seized nearly half the country and have repeatedly refused offers to negotiate with the Kabul government. The Us-backed government is rife with corruption, and many Afghans have said they do not expect the elections to be fair.
Officials at polling stations struggled with voter registration and a new biometric system that was aimed at stemming fraud but instead created enormous confusion because many of those trained on the system did not show up for work. The biometric machines arrived just a month before polls and there was no time to do field testing.
On Sunday, a roadside bomb in the eastern Nangarhar province struck a vehicle filled with civilians, killing 11 people, including six children. No one immediately claimed the attack.