Abdullah’s supporters burn voter cards during protest

HERAT CITY (Pajhwok): Dozens of presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah’s supporters, mostly students, held a protest demonstration over alleged electoral fraud in western Herat province.

Students taking part in the protest in Herat City, the provincial capital, burnt their voter registration cards in protest against alleged irregularities in the contest between Abdullah and rival Ashraf Ghani during the June 14 by-election.

Abdullah has boycotted the vote count and alleged that the turnout figure of seven million in the run-off was exaggerated, and that in several provinces there were more votes than eligible voters.

Sunday’s protests came a day after more than 1,000 of Abdullah’s supporters marched through Kabul in another largely peaceful demonstration.

The protestors in Herat accusing the two electoral bodies of paving the ground of widespread fraud, calling for separating fraudulent votes from bogus ones.

The protestors gathered in front of Herat Governor’s Office and burnt their voter cards.

“We braved threats and turned out in large numbers to exercise our legal right, but now it seems some individuals have started doing business on our votes,” said Maroof Paiman, a protestor.

He called on the electoral bodies to separate clean votes from fraudulent ones for the sake of transparency in the process.

Azizullah, another protestor, also accused the electoral commissions of being complicit electoral frauds.

“We want democracy and transparency in the process. We won’t allow anyone to play with our sentiments or misuse our votes,” he said.

The protestors warned if the relevant institutions did not endorse their demands, they would prolong their demonstrations until the international community intervened.

mrh/ma

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