Afghanistan's recent national election took months to plan - and it was still corrupt and lame. Now, there's going to be a second round. But this time, U.S., NATO and Afghan officials will only have three weeks to prep. Logistical trainwreck, anyone?
Afghan President Hamid Karzai fell short of the 50 percent that was required to avoid a runoff election, and he agreed to a runoff vote on November 7. His rival, Abdullah Abdullah, has hinted that he might be willing to join a coalition government instead. Still, if a runoff does take place, it will be a major undertaking on very short notice.
In the run-up to the Aug. 20 election, I attended planning sessions hosted by the U.S. military and followed U.S. troops as they scouted polling sites. Security was one major issue: Coalition forces expected Taliban attacks to disrupt voting, and the Afghan government needed to ensure that it had enough security forces to protect individual polling stations.
Collecting and counting ballots was another problem: Election monitors and ballot boxes would have to be transported, and reaching some of the more remote polling sites would require helicopters, motorcycles, sometimes even donkeys. The whole operation would hinge on major U.S. and NATO logistical assistance, and it would mean diverting more U.S. and International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) units to election-security missions, particularly in the country's violent eastern and southern provinces. If you want a reminder of how tough that particular job is, re-read Noah's election-day dispatch from Helmand Province.
Then there's the issue of weather. As winter approaches, some mountain communities may be hard to reach as the first winter snows make some roads impassable. I spent some time in north-central Bamiyan Province, which was hard enough to travel around in during the summer. In winter, many mountain trails become all but impassable.
And this quick-'n'-dirty runoff needs to be, well, less dirty. The Aug. 20 elections were marred by fraud (The New York Times has an excellent graphic that shows where fraudulent votes were cast), and this second-round vote will need a degree of legitimacy if it is to succeed.
Capt. Elizabeth Mathias, an ISAF spokeswoman, said the coalition was standing by to back up the Nov. 7 vote. "Our support will be much the same, of course in keeping with what the Afghan government and Independent Election Commission request of ISAF," she said.
In a gloomy commentary published late yesterday, Andrew Exum of the Center for a New American Security said the contested election, in many ways, has been a "worst-case scenario" for the U.S. and NATO mission.
First, the contested Afghan elections were, in many ways, a worst-case scenario for U.S. and other NATO policy-makers. "Prior to the elections, the scenario most feared by the international community was one in which Karzai was re-elected by a thin margin amid widespread irregularities and allegations of corruption," he wrote. "That is exactly what happened, leading a much-respected U.S. deputy to the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) to depart acrimoniously after witnessing what he perceived to be a U.N. cover-up of ballot box-stuffing and election-rigging."
-- Nathan Hodge and Noah Shachtman
[PHOTO: U.S. Department of Defense]
See Also:
- Danger Room in Afghanistan: An Election Rehearsal
- Afghanistan Tells Journos: No Election Criticism (Updated ...
- Danger Room in Afghanistan: Violence Spikes Ahead of Election ...
- No Bombs Means No Problems for Garmsir's Election Day
- Amid Bombs and Bullets, Afghanistan Votes
- Danger Room in Afghanistan: Echo Company in the Eye of the Storm ...
- Danger Room in Afghanistan: Parwan 911
