KABUL (Pajhwok): Political affairs experts and common people welcomed official launch of the voter’s registration drive on Saturday, but cautioned many might not be able to register in the two months time.
The voter’s registration process was officially launched Saturday in capital Kabul and major cities country-wide. The process would be completed in two months.
Kabul University lecturer and political affairs expert Faiz Mohammad Zaland said both voter’s registration and Computerized National Identity Card (CNIC) faced some technical issues and two months was a short time.
He added the country was at war and the security situation was not good, so how 10 million people would be able to get manual NICs and 20 million others to register as voters.
He asked the election commission to extend the deadline and increase resources so that the masses were able to get NICs and register as voters.
Another political affairs expert Qariburrahman Shahab said two months was a short time and feared many people would be left out of registration.
He said if 2,000 people got registered daily in Kabul’s voter registration center, even then it would need more time.
Haji Abdul Qayyum, deputy head of the Kandahar Provincial Council, said the most important things were people’s participation in elections and public awareness.
He stressed over women’s participation in the forthcoming polls and added women should get Tazkera and also register as voters.
Bismillah, a resident of 2nd police district of Kandahar City, said it was a positive step that the election commission launched the registration process based on Tazkera. He, however, said the period was short and many people might miss the process.
Malok Khan, a resident of Hesarak district and a tribal elder in eastern Nangarhar province, said the security situation in Hesarak had deteriorated and without six villages, the registration process could be conducted in other areas of the town.
Amanullah Enayat, a resident of eastern Nuristan and a tribal elder, said looking at the security situation and past experience of elections, no one would like to take part in the voter’s registration process.
He said the security situation should have been improved before launching the registration process.
Malak Mahbob Shah, a resident of eastern Laghman province, also said that security problems needed to be resolved first.
“If the government is able to attract public cooperation then both the registration process and the elections are possible”, he said.
Residents of Mazar-I-Sharif, the capital of northern Balkh province, were happy about the launch of the voters’ registration but they also stressed prevention of fraud.
Sayed Inayatullah, a resident of Mazar-i-Sharif, told Pajhwok that the launch of voters’ registration would assure people that the elections were going to be held.
But he expressed concern whether the elections would be free of fraud or fraudulent as they were in the past.
Inayatullah said he was not sure the government would be able to hold the elections within current resources and limited time.
Marjan, a resident of western Herat province, supported the launch of voters’ registration but stressed on transparency. He said people should be careful while voting their candidates.
Khadija Safari, a resident and civil society activist from central Bamyan province, said that people had lost trust in polls after previous elections were rigged.
But the government should take special steps to restore people’s trust in elections and participate in the registration process, she said.
Jamila Niazi, women’s affairs director of southern Helmand province, stressed the need for creating awareness about the voters’ registration process. She said many women would participate in elections if the security situation was better.
On the other hand, officials and people in eastern Nangarhar province say the registration process may face trouble in three districts of the province due to security problems.
Zabihullah Wagari, IEC head for Nangarhar, expressed concern about security obstacles in the way of registration process in Hesarak, Shirzad and Haska Mina districts.
However, the Nangarhar governor assured of special security measures for the registration process in districts where security situation was not good.
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