IEC silence on legality or illegality of vote recount questioned

KABUL (Pajhwok): The Electoral Integrity Observation Organizations Network on Wednesday said it supported any legal action from electoral management bodies, but questioned their silence on legality or illegality of the vote recount at provincial level.

“As no consent is obtained within all electoral stakeholders, particularly candidates, with electoral management bodies, a crisis may emerge soon,” warned the network in a statement.

The watchdog said its observation showed provincial Independent Election Commission (IEC) offices were closed by supporters of protesting candidates and votes recount was not started.

“First, IEC and IECC should throw light, in cooperation with Darmalog Company, about based on what decisions and technical reasons the ballots of 8,255 should be recounted.”

“Second, in accordance with Election Law and relevant procedures, IEC and IECC should start recounting in presence of all candidate agents, observers and media, and after the consent of all stakeholders is taken,” the statement said.

In addition, the network said, IEC and Darmalog should provide reasonable and legal responses to technical questions about supposedly voting stations.

“For instance, based on our observation, by QR Code during ballots recount in provinces about voting date and time (7 AM to 5 PM) it can be ensured that if those votes verified by QR codes can be verified as votes.”

 In other words, whether original voters casted their votes or a bunch of biased persons filled the boxes. In this regard, the Network is not sure confident.”

Recommendations:

IEC should stop recount process for two days and discuss with IECC partners mediated by UNAMA in a meeting with participation of candidates, observers and media about electoral complains and whether recount is legal and then restart votes recount after an agreement is reached on a transparent mechanism for recount.

IEC should develop and release a detailed report on election sensitive materials in which provinces are segregated by the polling centers and polling stations and how much sensitive materials were sent and how much were returned back safely to Kabul. So far, it has not been done.  

 IEC is requested to release the name of people responsible for sensitive material particularly broken or disappeared biometric devices and memory cards and introduce them to judiciary bodies.

 We believe that a boycotting recount process by some candidates is not an appropriate solution, but it disturbs election process. Therefore, candidates should go to IECC and register their complains and support recount process through meetings with IEC and IECC as well as observers and media. In general, boycotting election and recount in particular does not only resolve the issue but it destroys public opinions with regards to transparency of this national process.

International Community, UNAMA and EU in particular, can provide technical consultation for electoral management bodies to deal with the situation and boycotting candidates to impede their boycott.

pr/ma