Elections: Germany, Afghanistan

5 thoughts on “Elections: Germany, Afghanistan”

1. The spectre still haunts.
   Press reports say that neither Schroeder nor Merkel will talk to the “Linke”, even thought they are bigger than the Greens now.
   Let them have another election, then!
   As for Merkel, her party actually lost votes. She should resign, or be sacked.

2. Reports are describing the Afghanistan turnout as “low”. But, if the reports are to be believed, the threat of Taliban violence was not the major factor for the turnout. Instead low turnout is due to voter dissatisfaction with the poll; too many candidates, no one really knows what the candidates stand for, and warlords and cronies among the candidates. If this dissatisfaction is the true reason for the turnout then the Afghan people are finding a way to express their dissatisfaction by not voting for the candidates. I would hope then that this forces the current government to field candidates that are more relevant to the people’s needs, and that this could mobilize the people to be very aware of the quality of their candidates.

3. Pajhwok Afghan News reports voter turnout at around 50% and says that “turnout was slightly over 50 per cent, 17 per cent lower than the last year’s presidential votes”. Still, I’m not sure I would call that “low”; Mubarak’s fake presidential election in Egypt had a 23% voter turnout.
   The international media are perpetually confused about the nature of violence in Afghanistan, laying pretty much all of it at the feet of the Taliban, al Qaeda, or Gulbuddin Hekmatyr. The reason for this is that it’s in everyone’s interest … the UN, the US military, the NATO-led ISAF, the Afghan government, and local officials … to point their fingers in that direction. But in fact, much of the local violence is more mundane; tribal feuds, business deals gone bad, revenge, crime, people on the losing end of shifting political arrangements, etc. To the extent that local violence was related to the elections, I think a lot of it was aimed at intimidation to encourage a particular result … but not at disrupting the parliamentary elections themselves.
   Political parties in Afghanistan are extremely recent and not well organized. All that I know of are offshoots of militias, which are themselves grown out of local village structures. There are no platforms to speak of. Afghan voters don’t have great sophistication in assessing individual issues in the absence of platforms or parties, and candidates haven’t really ‘marketed’ to them in that way. Afghans are, however, very sophisticated about the candidates themselves; their histories, their families, their interests, their alliances. The way they use this information in making a voting decision is much more complex than what we are used to in the West, because it is a lot more personal … and it’s not hard to understand why that would be even more the case when electing local representatives to the lower house.
   It’s worth noting that local media coverage and ‘civic education’ projects in advance of these elections were nothing like last year’s push before the presidentials. I think a lot of the enthusiasm resulted from that push, and surveys taken long before (by the Asia Foundation), immediately in advance of (by Afghan NGO the Center for International Journalism, in preparinga voter’s supplement), and immediately after the elections (UNAMA and JEMB) bear that out.
   Ballots are being transported now to regional counting centers; counting begins tomorrow. Results are expected within two weeks, with final certification before October 22d.

4. The best reporting I’ve read about the Afghan elections has come from the IWPR, http://www.iwpr.net
   From what they write, I gather that political parties were somehow excluded from the process — which I think means that candidates could not list party affiliation, nor could they run on slates. The worry is that this will generate a weak, fractious parliament. But I think it makes sense. The only “parties” extent reflect the “warlord” power structure. Attempting to limit the influence of these people could be a helpful thing. Sure, many elections will still be controlled by the “warlords” but many will not — hopefully the set-asides for women will yield some new voices. And the time consuming process of developing coalitions and new parties is just part of the process and not something to be short circuited.
   I commented here after the presidential election saying that they presidential election was just a dress rehearsal for this one. There was no doubt about the outcome then. And it gave them a “practice” election to work out logistics. Low turnout is worrisome, but not unexpected since this ballot is much harder to understand. I can’t wait to hear some results, which are not expected for a few days.

5. KC,
   I recommend Pajhwok, which is Afghanistan’s independent (not state-owned) news agency. They put out more than three dozen stories a day in Pashto, Dari and Urdu; ten to twenty of these are usually translated into English. The forty-some reporters and couple-dozen stringers at Pajhwok were trained in the same manner (and in most cases by the same people) as IWPR’s two seasoned Afghan journalists, but the Pajhwok program was more rigorous and extensive. The main difference for me is that aside from scale (Pajhwok has ten bureaus throughout the country, and stringers elsewhere) Pajhwok’s stories are reported, written, edited, translated, managed and produced by Afghans; their reports aren’t worked over, contaminated and sexed up in London to make them look like BBC-Lite, as IWPR’s are.
   I agree with your comments, especially about the ‘dress rehearsal’ factor in the presidential elections. A couple caveats: First, there was some substantive political work done to solidify things behind Karzai, which was not dress rehearsal. Second, I think the main thing being rehearsed was not logistics but democratic practice, getting people used to all the prepatory discussion and such before casting their vote (for example, public readings and discussion groups held in collaboration with the village shuras). Didn’t get as much ink, but I think it had a more enduring impact.

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