KABUL) begins the vote recount process despite opposition from the Stability and Partnership team, according to a statement from the election body.
IEC has asked observes to be present on due date and time for the audit and recount process because of the shortage of time.
Earlier, the IEC had decided the recount of thousands of polling stations and said different delegations will travel to the provinces for this purpose.
According to a source, the ballot boxes present in the provincial offices which has no evidence regarding fraud will be reopened in front of observers, media and the Independent Electoral Complaint (IECC) officials for audit and recount.
After the audit process is completed, the result sheet will be registered in the biometric data, recount forms and then dispatched to the IEC with the recount form.
The IEC decision also noted that the issue of biometric chips and devices which are not dispatched to the central office should be audited and investigated.
The IEC also decided audit and recount of 1,136 polling stations which were opened in front of polling station’s head, local officials and security officials but its result sheets, biometric devices chips and other information not reached to the IEC office.
IEC meeting decided an audit and to the ballot boxes if their is no documents regarding fraud and rigging and suggested article one to be applied.
It decided that in line with detail investigation of the provincial IEC office in all relevant issues, deputy district chief, polling centre director and head should be dealt with according to law.
Five IEC Commissioners Hawa Alam Nuristani, Estamullah Mal, Musafir Quqandi, Awrangzaib and Mohammadn Hanif Danishyar has signed while Mawlana Abdullah and Rahima Zarifi did not signed under the IEC decisions.
Mawlana Adullah wrote the decision is against the article 19 clause two of the election law and will provide legitimacy to none-biometric votes.
The Stability and Partnership team also opposed the decision and accused the IEC over violation of the law.
A statement released by Abdullah’s team said that the IEC did not separate fraudulent votes from clean ones based on the law and procedures and started recount process of votes in its provincial offices without distinguishing non-biometric votes, find the number of clean votes and determine clean votes of each polling station.
The source said that the IEC made the decision as duplicate votes, out of time votes and other fraudulent votes yet to be cleared. “Aside from that, the IEC also recounts the votes of 2,432 polling stations which no one is aware about their existence and have no biometric data,” the source said.
The statement stated that Abdullah’s team once again emphasizes on separation of fraudulent votes from clean votes and the IEC should act according to the law and procedures regarding election transparency.
The team’s leadership has ordered all its provincial offices not to participate in observing the illegal recount process of votes until the issue clarifies, the statement added.
On the other hand, Ashraf Ghani’s team says IEC’s decision was right. The teams’ spokesman, Sayed Khalid Sadat said that they supported the commission’s decision about lost electoral materials.
Sattar Sadat, a legal expert in a Facebook post said that Ghani had secured majority of votes of more than 47pc which led the election to a second round based on neutral votes counting process, but the IEC’s recent decision made Ghani the winner.
It would be cleared later whether other candidates show a reaction or not, but the IEC made one of its worst decisions and totally destroyed its impartiality, he added.
Pajhwok Afghan News had obtained some documents earlier that showed the votes of 8,494 polling stations would be recounted.
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