Voters defy attacks, delays to choose new Afghan president Improvement in biometric voting machines
FIGHT FOR DEMOCRACY Many Afghans said voting was smooth as several Taliban attacks reported
KABUL: Afghans voted in presidential elections amid tight security on Saturday, even as insurgents attacked polling centres in a series of blasts and clashes across the country that left at least two people dead.
The first-round vote marks the culmination of a bloody election campaign that despite a large field of candidates is seen as a close race between President Ashraf Ghani and his bitter rival Abdullah Abdullah, the country’s chief executive.
Wary authorities placed an uneasy Kabul under partial lockdown, flooding streets with troops and banning trucks from entering the city in an effort to stop would-be suicide bombers targeting residents as they cast their votes.
Polls closed at 5:00 pm local time after a two-hour extension due to long queues of people still waiting to vote, the Independent Election Commission said.
Compared to previous elections, the initial toll appeared relatively light, though authorities provided little information about reported blasts and ongoing armed clashes with the Taliban in various provinces.
A s e c uri t y of f i c i al who requested anonymity told AFP that two civilians had been killed and 27 wounded in Taliban bombings and mortar attacks at polling centres across the country.
Serious security incidents were reported in several provinces including Kunduz, Nangarhar, Kabul, Bamiyan and Kandahar. The Taliban, who unleashed a string of bombings during the two-month election campaign, claimed to have conducted hundreds of attacks against Afghanistan’s “fake elections”.
Ghani, having voted at a Kabul high school, said the most important issue was finding a leader with a mandate to bring peace to the war-torn nation.
“Our roadmap (for peace) is ready, I want the people to give us permission and legitimacy so that we pursue peace,” said Ghani, who is seeking a second term.
Some 9.6 million Afghans are registered to vote, but many lack faith that after 18 years of war any leader can unify the fractious country and improve basic living conditions, boost the stagnating economy or bolster security.
Observers from the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission said t urnout appeared to be low, especially among women.
Still, many voters braved insurgent attacks and long queues to cast a ballot.
“I know there are security threats but bombs and attacks have become part of our everyday lives,” 55-year-old Mohiuddin, who only gave one name, told AFP.
“I am not afraid, we have to vote if we want to bring changes.”
Abdullah and Ghani both claimed victory in the 2014 election -- a vote so tainted by fraud and violence that it led to a constitutional crisis and forced then-us president Barack Obama to push for a compromise that saw Abdullah awarded the subordinate role.
“The only request I have from the election commission is that they ensure the transparency of the election because lots of people have lost their trust,” said Afghan voter Sunawbar Mirzae, 23.Voting in Afghanistan’s fourth presidential election was supposed to take place at some 5,000 polling centres across the country but hundreds were closed due to the security situation.
Many Afghans said voting went smoothly, triumphantly holding up fingers stained in indelible ink to show they had cast a ballot, but several said they had experienced problems. Biometric machines aimed at preventing fraud in Afghanistan’s presidential election performed better than in a poll last year but still left voters waiting a long time to cast their ballots, election observers said on Saturday. The machines were used for the first time in the October parliamentary poll, when many malfunctioned or failed to work altogether. Chaos during that vote was blamed on the machines’ performance, along with incomplete voting lists and delays in holding the election. The Independent Election Commission gave staff more training and issued spare batteries for the devices.