Voices From the Polls

Polling at Zarghona High School, Kabul. Picture by Jean MacKenzie.

The old man held his ballot sheet up to the light, searching for his chosen politician among the nearly 400 parliamentary candidates standing just in Kabul. But the pictures, symbols and numbers meant to identify them were too small for his poor eyesight.

He eventually gave up, and told IWPR that he simply put a mark on the ballot paper without knowing who he had voted for.

The novelty and sheer complexity of the September 18 election, in which close to 6,000 candidates across Afghanistan are standing for a national parliament and provincial councils, has left many voters baffled.

In the southern province of Zabul, would-be voters wandered aimlessly through streets of one town because there were no signs directing them to the polling station.

Although there were reports of violations of election rules including pressure to vote for particular candidates, many of the people IWPR spoke to at various polling stations were more worried about whether they could make sense of the pages-long voting papers.

At a polling station in the capital, Abdul Qayum, 47, was having problems. Speaking after casting his vote, he said, "I found it really hard to find the candidate I wanted on the long list – it took me 10 minutes. I think lots of other people will have the same problem."

The few instructions and election information sheets posted up at the polling stations proved unhelpful to most voters – especially as literacy rates are low. One merely showed how to cast a ballot paper, while another reminded the people that Kalashnikovs, pistols and knives should not be brought into the voting area.

There were some reports of candidates seeking to gain an unfair advantage over their rivals.

In the Dasht-e-Barchi district of Kabul, parliamentary candidate Fatima accused some female election monitors of urging voters to support Haji Mohammad Mohaqeq, a former militia commander.

"Mohaqeq's representatives are encouraging people to vote for him," she charged.

Candidates were allowed to place supporters as observers inside polling stations, in addition to the independent Afghan and international monitors present there, but they were not allowed to pressure voters.

Similar allegations were made at the Hussainia polling centre, also in Kabul. One woman voter, Soraya, said poll observers – once again female - were threatening people who would not vote for Mohaqeq, saying they would face retribution later.

While no one would want to be coerced, many voters would probably have appreciated some more guidance from election workers. Zarlasht, a woman clad in the all-enveloping blue burqa, said, "There has to be someone who can instruct people who don't know how to vote about how to do it. There are lots of women who can't distinguish between the parliamentary and provincial council ballot papers."

Local radio reported that two women were arrested for election violations in the southern Kandahar province. One was reportedly campaigning for a candidate inside the polling centre, while another was found carrying 12 voter registration cards, apparently in the hope that the indelible ink used to prevent voters from casting more than one ballot would be ineffective.

Many women did know exactly how they wanted to vote. Bibi Rubabah, 30, was the first woman to vote at the Zarghona Girls' High School in central Kabul. She told IWPR, "I voted for the person who will make Afghanistan safe and who'll send our children to school and make them literate."

Another woman of 67, who declined to be named, said pragmatically, "I am voting for the person who will pave the roads in our area."

There were more observers than voters to be seen one polling station, Number 236, located in Kabul. Ten female observers sheltering in the shade of a tree complained that officials had stopped them going into the centre.

One of the observers, Ramzia, represents Etedal-e-Milli, one of nearly 80 Afghan groups to win officially registration as a political party. But she said, "An official told me he didn’t know of a party named Etedal, and said I wasn’t to bother him – he was upset enough as it was."

Shahab Amini, an official at the polling station, denied the accusation, "No one has been prevented from entering. There is an observer in each room but it's impossible for us to let all these 10 observers into one room at once."

Turnout varied throughout the capital. A polling station at the Qala-ye-Kashef school in southwest Kabul didn’t start work until 7.10 am although polls had been scheduled to open at six. But the delayed opening may be attributed to the fact that only 15 people had turned up to vote by the time the doors opened. At another polling site, a mere eight people were waiting when it opened.

In the north of the capital, Shah Wali Naqshbandi, in charge of a polling station there, had a ready answer for opening late, "We started later because the female staff were late. We arrived at four am and the female staff came later. But the observers were not yet here at that point, so we didn't start distributing the voting materials throughout the centre."

At the Abdul Rahim-e-Shaheed High School in west Kabul, some 400 men and 50 women were lined up by the official opening time, but they had to wait patiently until officials opened the doors at 6.30, half an hour late.

By late morning, the number at the school had dwindled markedly. "There are many fewer people than in the [October 2004] presidential election," said a security guard. "Then, we didn't have time to sit down until three in the afternoon, but today it's just 10 in the morning and we're able to have a sit down."

IWPR reporters who witnessed both elections were struck by how few people appeared to be coming out to vote on a balmy day that had been declared a public holiday, in contrast to the turnout last October in much harsher weather.

But voter Abdul Qayum said he was not surprised at the apparently sparse turnout. Asked why he thought so few people were out to vote, he answered, "What did the presidential candidate, for whom people voted, do for them? So what can a parliamentary candidate do? People are pessimistic, upset and fed up"

Another voter, 55-year-old Sharafuddin, echoed his sentiments, "[President Hamed] Karzai and his cabinet are traitors to the nation. I would beg the parliamentary candidates to forget about their own interests, stop building more houses for themselves, and to please feel the pain of the people."