Half of nomads to be deprived of voting

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AT-KABUL: Some 50 per cent of the Kuchis (nomads) would be deprived of attending in this month’s 20th legislative elections, officials warned.

The independent department for the nomads said Tuesday that if the polling took place according to the current electoral procedure, thousands of the nomads would not be able to vote.

Abdollah Wahedyar, spokesman of the department, said that the nomads were moving from the cold areas to the warm tropical regions, but they were not registered in the lists of election in the tropical areas.

“The nomads have registered to vote, but 50 per cent of them will not be able to vote and elect their favorite candidates as they are moving to the warm areas, where their names are not in the polling lists,” said Wahedyar.

He added that 500,000 of five million nomads had registered to vote.

10 of 249 parliament seats are allocated for the representatives of nomads and 44 men and women are competing to occupy these seats.

People can vote only in a polling center where he/she had registered, according to the electoral procedure.

“We have already talked to the elders of nomads and this has been certified that the entire Afghanistan is one center for the nomads and they can vote in those polling stations where they have registered,” said Zabihollah Sadat, deputy spokesman of the independent election commission.

The nomads department asked the election commission to make a new procedure to solve the problem, despite only 12 days left to election.

The Free and Fair Election Forum of Afghanistan (FEFA) says this was a big problem and the election commission should send the list from cold areas to the warm regions so that nomad could attend election.