By Shadi Khan Saif
KABUL, Afghanistan (AA) – Amid a politically charged atmosphere, Afghan election authorities on Wednesday finally announced the date for the country’s much-awaited presidential elections.
Abdul Aziz Ibrahim of the Independent Election Commission said the presidential polls would be held next spring, on April 20, 2018, close on the heels of the Oct. 20, 2018 Wolesi Jirga (lower house) elections.
“This means there is immense pressure on us, but we’re working tirelessly on matters such as drafting the initial budget, and another serious issue remains the fragile security situation,” he told reporters in the capital Kabul.
He added that the voter registration process has been completed for both elections, which amounts to 50 percent of the work for the presidential polls.
Afghanistan’s leading political parties — the Hezb-e-Islami party led by former Mujahedeen leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, the Jamiat-e-Islami party led by Foreign Minister Salahuddin Rabbani, and the Junbish-e-Islami party led by Vice President Abdul Rasheed Dostum — have raised serious concerns over the voter registration process.
The 2014 presidential elections were marred by rampant irregularities that brought the country to the brink of a political crisis, prompting then-U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to intervene to coax the frontrunners, President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani and his rival Abdullah Abdullah, to a power-sharing agreement and formation of the National Unity Government.
