KABUL: Afghanistan chief executive Abdullah Abdullah claimed victory on Monday over incumbent Ashraf Ghani in the weekend’s presidential election, far ahead of the release of any official results.

The move is likely to stir political tensions across Afghanistan and brings to mind the election Abdullah and his top rival Ghani bitterly contested in 2014 that sparked a constitutional crisis and prompted US intervention.

“We have the most votes in this election,” Abdullah said at a news conference, without giving a basis for his assertion.

“The results will be announced by the IEC (Independent Election Com­mission), but we have the most votes. The election is not going to go to a second round.” Abdullah’s anno­u­ncement comes even before the IEC has finished tallying turnout from Saturday’s election, with hundreds of polling centres still unreported.

Preliminary results are not due until October 19, and if the leading candidate doesn’t secure more than 50 percent of the vote the top two will run off in a second round.

Almost immediately, senior IEC of­­­­­­­ficial Habib Rahman Nang slam­m­­ed Abdullah’s announcement as premature.

“No candidate has the right to dec­­lare himself the winner,” Nang said.

“According to the law, it is the IEC that decides who is the winner.” Abdullah, who is seeking the presidency for the third time after losing in 2009 and 2014, said his team would “make the new government”.

Without giving details, Abdullah also mentioned reports of “some government officials” meddling in the election process.

His remarks follow the release on social media of several videos purporting to show election workers stuffing ballots in favour of Ghani.

The IEC’s complaints division head, Zuhra Bayan Shinwari, said the panel had so far received 2,569 complaints.

Previous Afghan polls have been marred by widespread allegations of systemic fraud, so the stakes are high for the IEC, which has promised a clean process this year with rigorous steps to curtail cheating.

Commentators suggested the videos of apparent ballot stuffing could either have been made by rivals trying to discredit Ghani, or else produced as proof that the rigging had actually been carried out.

But even if true, the IEC insists it has ample safeguards against such blatant fraud through new technology and voter verification techniques, particularly biometric devices designed to ensure each person only voted once.

“The management of election day was better than previous elections and security was better,” said Ahmad Zubair Habibzada, a spokesman for the Transparent Election Foundation of Afghanistan, an election watchdog that dispatched about 5,200 observers across the country.

Despite a large pool of candidates, the election was seen as a two-horse race between Abdullah and Ghani.

They both claimed victory in the 2014 poll — a vote so tainted by fraud and violence that it forced the administration of then-US president Barack Obama to push for a compromise that saw Abdullah awarded the subordinate role.

Saturday’s election was also marred by hundreds of small-scale Taliban attacks at polling stations, but the insurgents were unable to steal the headlines.

Published in Dawn, October 1st, 2019