Sunday, January 22, 2017
Kabul (BNA) Officials of the Independent Elections Commission (IEC) said that efforts were underway to finalize the list of voters and polling centers and the date of parliamentary elections will be soon declared.
The IEC commissioner, Rafiullah Bidar said, ‘we are making effort to present a comprehensive plan on polling centers to the president and we will declare the date of parliamentary elections in upcoming month.’
He stressed that the commission would also announce its decision on invalidation and validation of 21 million distributed cards.
The IEC officials have confirmed that holding parliamentary elections would be impossible sans the government and international community support, adding efforts are underway to hold a transparent and without fraud election. At the same time, complaining on slowness of the electoral commissions’ works, the officials said they have not done their works as proper as the people had expected.
The spokesperson for Transparent Election Foundation of Afghanistan (TEFA), Sughra Sadat said, ‘the electoral commissions should be prepared for a big exam in order to hold a transparent election.’
Expressing optimism on the government steps on bringing electoral reforms and introduction of new members of the election commission, the civil society organizations stressed that to hold a transparent parliamentary election, bringing reforms have been the only solution.
Likewise, stressing on electoral reforms, the lawmakers said, ‘the people of Afghanistan expect the electoral reforms to be done at its earliest and they don’t a fraudulent election in the future anymore, thus, the government should soon specify the parliamentary elections date.’
Gul Ahmad Azimi, a senator believes that the only reason resulted to forming of the National Unity Government (NUG) had been the electoral reforms, thus, by introduction of new IEC members, the government had practiced one of its commitments.
But now, the people expect the electoral entities to be prepared for parliamentary elections.
Meanwhile, a number of political experts believe that electoral reforms are the only required strategies for holding parliamentary elections.
A political expert, Akram Andishmand said, ‘the NUG leaders should practice what they have committed at the very first days of the government establishment. Likewise, to hold transparent parliamentary elections, the Afghans believe that the electoral reforms are essential.’
An analyst on Afghanistan and regional affairs, Sahib Nazar Muradi said, ‘the people of Afghanistan have witnessed elections for three times, they stress that if reforms are not brought in electoral laws and commissions, they won’t participate in the parliamentary elections.’
This is while that the NUG leaders have always stressed that bringing reforms in the electoral commissions are our priorities.
Suraya Raiszada
