Poll results will be announced within next two days: IEC

KABUL (TOLO News): The Independent Election Commission (IEC) has started the audit of disputed votes and will announce the final results of the September presidential elections within the next two days, the deputy of the commission said.

The process was delayed for three days because of a protest from Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah’s campaign team.

“The decisions of the Independent Electoral Complaints Commission reached us in the past few days and we have worked on it and finally, today, we officially started implementing them, both in the center and in provinces of Afghanistan,” IEC chairperson Hawa Alam Nuristani said.

“It will not take more time. We will complete our work within one or two days, and we will announce the final results,” said Esmatullah Mal, the IEC deputy chief.

According to the special audit, if 65% of the disputed votes meet the characteristics of transparent votes, all the disputed votes will be validated, but if 35% of the votes do not complete the measure, all the disputed votes will be recounted – once again.

“We match the number of the center and a local code with the database,” said Sayedullah, an IEC official. “Then we check the biometric information… and we register it here.”

President Ghani’s campaign team, State Builder, approved the audit of the disputed votes, but the process was boycotted by Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah’s Stability and Convergence campaign team.

“We have continued the process up until now, and if the voice of right is heard otherwise, we will withdraw from the process,” said Fazl Ahmad Manawi, technical head of Abdullah’s campaign. “In that case, they can announce the result and it will be evident to the people, and we will see from whom they will accept the results.”

“They should have required coordination based on their duties,” said Nasir Nasir Zada, member of the Free and Fair Election Foundation of Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, the IEC started the recount of votes in 298 polling stations from which biometric information was lost, in nine provinces.

Moreover, the commission claims to have completed the audit of disputed votes in Ghazni, Helmand and Sar-e-Pul provinces.