Afghan presidential polls set for April 20

By Shadi Khan Saif</p> <p>KABUL, Afghanistan (AA) – Afghanistan’s presidential election will take place next April 20, with results due by June, the electoral authority in the conflict-ridden country announced on Monday.</p> <p>The 12-day registration of presidential hopefuls will start next week, Gulajan Abdulbadi Sayad, head of the Independent Election Commission (IEC), told a news conference in the capital Kabul. </p> <p>“All necessary preparations and an action plan are in place, soon the recruitment of staff for the presidential polls will also begin,” he said.</p> <p>He pledged the results of the April 20 presidential polls would be out by June. </p> <p>Afghanistan’s 2014 presidential elections were marred by widespread claims of irregularities, threatening another civil war, before then-U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, intervened and convinced the two main rivals, Mohammad Ashraf Ghani (current president) and Abdullah Abdullah (power-sharing CEO), to form a national unity government.</p> <p>Ghani’s office says he will seek another term. Other announced hopefuls include Mohammad Haneef Atmar, a former longstanding national security adviser who parted ways with Ghani this August, citing “serious differences.”