Ghani, Abdullah at odds over delay in runoff election

KABUL (Pajhwok): Campaign teams of leading presidential candidates on Friday indicated they were at odds on the delay in holding a possible run-off vote.

Dr. Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai’s team said it had no issue with a delay in the second-round election, but the Dr. Abdullah camp insisted on holding the polls on schedule.

A source in the Independent Election Commission (IEC) said on Wednesday the panel wanted the run-off elections to take place on June 14, although a second round has not been formally announced so far.

The official, who did not want to be named, said the commission had decided to hold the second-round ballot in mid-June — 17 days behind original schedule. He refused to go into details.

Mohammad Amin Mrastial, a member of Ahmadzai’s team, told Pajhwok Afghan News the IEC wanted to thoroughly investigate fraud claims before the second round.

“Many Afghans want fraud charges and violations of the election law to be probed seriously. Delaying the polls for reasons of transparency is better than ignoring irregularities,” he remarked.

On the other hand, Fazlur Rahman Orya, Abdullah team’s spokesman, said Afghanistan’s constitution and laws were pretty clear on the second round of elections. He called for avoiding steps that were in conflict with the law.

He added the electoral bodies were duty-bound to implement the constitution and the election law. He asked the IEC to stick to its original timeline if a runoff vote became inevitable.

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