Afghan president: Courts cannot change election

[August 10, 2011]  KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- Afghanistan's president issued a decree Wednesday stating that the country's courts do not have the power to alter election results, a move appeared aimed at ending months of uncertainty over the parliament's legitimacy.

The Afghan parliament has been in limbo after a special court in June called for the removal of 62 sitting lawmakers, saying they won their seats through fraud.

In his decree, President Hamid Karzai said that the Independent Election Commission -- which organized the vote -- holds the final authority on deciding vote counts and results. Presidential spokesman Siamak Herawi said the commission will evaluate the court's findings and will decide if any candidates should be removed.

"Based on the national interest of the country, Karzai has said that all those documents and evidence will be passed to the IEC. He gave the IEC authority to make a final decision," Herawi said.

Many international observers have claimed that Karzai was using the court to pack the legislature with his supporters, and the country's Western allies have argued that the court's call for the lawmaker's removal was unconstitutional. Under Afghan law, only the IEC and a vote-fraud monitoring body are empowered to change the results.

Afghanistan's September 2010 ballot was plagued by irregularities and voter intimidation. The fraud monitors discarded 1.3 million ballots -- nearly a quarter of the total -- for fraud, and disqualified 19 winning candidates for cheating.

While the decree is aimed at finally ending the debate over who has final say on the election results, its wording appeared contradictory.

The decree states: "The legal findings of the appeals court should be finalized as soon as possible by the election commission."

But Herawi said this meant that the commission should make the final decision, not it was being ordered by Karzai to implement the court's findings.

The chief electoral officer for the commission said this was the decision for which they had been hoping.

"This is mainly a decree to finalize, or put an end, to this issue," Abdullah Ahmadzai said. He said that the commission hopes to finish making rulings within the next week.

The election commission will be evaluating decisions made by a fraud-monitoring watchdog that has already finished its term. Ahmadzai said it was his understanding that the IEC has the authority to examine these decisions since it is the only electoral body currently active. According to the decree, the special court work has been completed.

The debate over the final election results started when the attorney general's office launched a separate investigation into allegations of ballot manipulation -- a move that eventually led to the establishment of the special tribunal.

In January, the 249-member body was inaugurated after a standoff with Karzai, who had threatened to delay convening parliament until the court cases were concluded.

[Associated Press; By RAHIM FAIEZ and HEIDI VOGT]

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