As the fourth presidential poll emerges, many Afghans suspect systemic fraud in the presidential election.
What We Know:
- President Ashraf Ghani is running for his second and final five-year term for the country of Afghanistan.
- The people of Afghanistan have received multiple threats of violence from the Taliban, hoping to scare them away from the polls. Despite the ongoing threats, people have taken the risk to make their votes count in the fourth presidential election.
- The violence in Afghanistan has yet to subside after multiple rocket attacks and bombings throughout the many cities, including Ghor, Nangarhar, Kandahar and more.
- A variety of tactics have been used to discourage people from voting. Voters have become outraged after discovering that their names have vanished from the ballots despite having submitted their votes, which constitutes fraud. Others have been falsely accused of attempting to vote twice using duplicate IDs which has restricted them from voting overall. In addition to this, voters have been denied entry to the polls because due to their names purposely not being listed on the voter roll. Many voters have been accused of falsifying documents to vote. Voters have also encountered technical issues at the poll stations, which has caused delays and unaccounted votes.
- High school student, Yar Mohammed, shared his frustrations with the dishonesty associated with the presidential election. “They keep saying ‘fraud, fraud fraud’, but if this isn’t systematic, planned fraud, I don’t know what is. It seems like the commission itself is the one trying to make fraud.”
- Multiple cities in Afghanistan have had a low turnout at the polls because of both the violence and the hassle, which has caused the election to fall under major scrutiny.
Despite all the chaos, we hope that any fraudulent activity is investigated and handled accordingly.
