Presidential election in Afghanistan 2009

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The presidential election in Afghanistan in 2009 was the second presidential election since the overthrow of the Taliban regime as a result of the US-led intervention in October 2001. The incumbent Hamid Karzai , who, along with his colleague, the former Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah, was the favorite for the presidency, was accepted by declared President of the Election Commission on November 2, 2009 and finally officially sworn in on November 19. A planned runoff between Karzai and Abdullah had previously been canceled because Abdullah had announced about a week before the election date that he did not want to run in a runoff in the second round. Previously, the first ballot, which took place on August 20, 2009, was overshadowed by election manipulation and several bomb attacks in the run-up to the election. Karzai had missed the absolute majority necessary for victory in this first round of elections.

Starting position

President Hamid Karzai ran for re-election.

After the Loja Jirga , the Grand Council, adopted a new constitution for the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan on January 4, 2004, the first presidential election took place in October 2004. The interim President Hamid Karzai, who was appointed in the Petersberg process , won the election by a clear margin and was sworn in as the first elected President of Afghanistan.

According to the constitution, a presidential election should take place at least one month before the end of Karzai's term of office at the end of May 2009, but the Independent Electoral Commission recommended in April 2008 that the election date be postponed to late summer 2009. Originally, a merger with the parliamentary election planned for 2010 was even considered, but this proposal sparked protests from the opposition parties.

But since the postponement of the election date to August 20, 2009, Karzai's term of office expired before the elections, a power vacuum threatened Afghanistan. Several parties announced that they would no longer recognize Karzai as president after May 21, 2009. Karzai then tried by decree to bring the election forward to April 21, but X failed due to opposition from parliament and from ISAF , which was responsible for security during the ballot. Karzai then agreed to remain in office temporarily after his mandate expired.

Candidates

Candidate Abdullah Abdullah

A total of 36 candidates, including the MP Schala Ata and Frozan Fana , the widow of Abdul Rahman , two women, applied for the presidency.

Incumbent Hamid Karzai had declared his readiness for a second term early on, but surprised observers with the nomination of the former leader of the Northern Alliance , Mohammed Fahim , as his deputy. With the nomination of the Tajik Fahim, Karzai tried to win voters from northern Afghanistan, but internationally his decision was criticized by diplomats and human rights groups.

The National United Front, which emerged from the Northern Alliance, nominated the former Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah for the office of president. Abdullah was very popular not only among the Tajiks but also among the Pashtuns , and was considered the only serious challenger to Karzai.

With the former Treasury Secretary Ashraf Ghani , an economic expert stepped up, who is also said to have been the preferred candidate of the United States. Another independent candidate was the former Minister of Planning, Ramasan Bashardost , of the Hazara people . Polls gave him and Ghani a chance of third place in the presidential election.

Situation before the election

Election poster for Hamid Karzai

The election campaign was overshadowed by the increasing instability of the security situation in the capital Kabul. In the last days before the first ballot, numerous people were killed in bomb attacks. On August 15, 2009, five people died in a suicide attack in front of the ISAF headquarters. Two days before the election, the presidential palace was hit with rockets.

Leaders of the radical Islamic Taliban announced further attacks on election day and called on the Afghans to boycott the election. They threatened potential voters to cut off their inked fingers when they cast their votes . The government responded to the violence with a news blackout to prevent Afghans from staying away from polling stations for fear of further attacks.

More than 200,000 Afghan and 100,000 foreign police officers and soldiers were supposed to ensure the safety of the approximately 17 million eligible voters. Due to the difficult security situation in the east and south of Afghanistan, election observers could only be deployed in two thirds of the country.

Six days before the election published survey saw Karzai at a voting share of 44%, which he is a runoff would have to make. His likely opponent in a second ballot would therefore have been Abdullah Abdullah, who was predicted to receive almost 30% of the vote.

First ballot

On election day, August 20, 2009, a total of 73 attacks were registered by the Afghan authorities. The worst incident was reported in the northern Afghan city of Baglan , where insurgents stormed the city to prevent polling stations from opening. Police chief Baglans and 21 Taliban fighters were killed in the fighting.

State election observers and representatives of the United Nations reported a surprisingly high turnout, but independent journalists could not confirm this information. Especially in the Taliban-controlled south and east of Afghanistan, there was extremely low participation. The Independent Electoral Commission received numerous complaints about electoral fraud and attempts to influence the ballot. Independent election observers from the local organization Fefa ( Free and Fair Election Foundation of Afghanistan ) reported multiple votes, the participation of underage voters and the filling of the ballot boxes with forged ballot papers. Representatives of the European Union , on the other hand, described the elections as “largely positive”.

Just one day after the election, the Independent Electoral Commission announced that the counting of all votes in the polling stations had ended, but that the individual lists still had to be checked. The turnout is said to have been 40 to 50%, which means that participation in the presidential elections in 2004 was clearly undercut. Both Karzai and Abdullah had their supporters declare themselves the election winners. Official results should not be announced until September.

Election results

On August 25, 2009, the Independent Electoral Commission announced the first interim results of the vote count. Accordingly, Hamid Karzai had a 40.6% share of the vote, only a small lead over Abdullah Abdullah, who came to 38.7%. The interim result was based on around 10% of the votes cast. Further interim results indicated that Karzai had a clearer lead.

During the counting of the votes, however, the allegations of massive electoral fraud increased, which delayed the announcement of the final election results. On September 15, 2009, the electoral commission finally ordered recounts in more than 3000 polling stations. EU election observers feared that up to 1.5 million votes were faked. United Nations observers also admitted that there was “significant and far-reaching electoral fraud”.

Despite the pending review of the ballot papers, a preliminary final result was announced on September 16, 2009. Accordingly, incumbent Karzai had already won the necessary absolute majority for re-election in the first ballot with 54.6% of the votes. His challenger Abdullah Abdullah got a share of the vote of 27.8%, the turnout was only 38.7%. However, the election commission announced that it would wait until the fraud allegations had been clarified before appointing Karzai as the election winner.

The investigations by the complaints commission dragged on for several weeks. On October 19, 2009, the commission finally announced that hundreds of thousands of votes were invalid. The results from 210 polling stations were canceled. A day later, the Independent Electoral Commission declared that, according to the results of the Complaints Commission, Karzai had missed an absolute majority, his share of the vote was only 49.67%. November 7, 2009 was set as the date for the runoff between Karzai and Abdullah Abdullah.

Canceled second ballot

Karzai immediately agreed to run the runoff election. Previously, in view of the uncertain outcome of the elections, representatives of the EU and the United States had urged their competitors to form a unity government.

Karzai's challenger Abdullah made his participation in the runoff election dependent on the fulfillment of several conditions; as a consequence of the numerous manipulations in the first round of voting, he demanded the dismissal of the chairman of the election commission. When the Afghan government failed to comply with Abdullah's demands, the latter declared his withdrawal from the race for president. Regardless of this, Hamid Karzai wanted to stand in the runoff election on November 7, 2009 even without a candidate.

The Independent Electoral Commission canceled the runoff election on November 2, 2009 and declared incumbent Karzai as the only remaining candidate for the new president. On November 19, 2009, Karzai was sworn in for a second term.

Web links

Commons : Afghan presidential election, 2009  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Reuters : Afghanistan's presidential poll set for late 2009 of April 9, 2008 (accessed August 18, 2009).
  2. ↑ Spiegel Online : Karzai's election maneuver provoked the West of 28 February 2009 (accessed on 18 August 2009).
  3. ^ Spiegel Online : The constitutional crisis surrounding Karzai, March 7, 2009 (accessed on August 18, 2009).
  4. ↑ Die Welt : Karzai relies on a notorious warlord from August 18, 2009 (accessed on August 18, 2009) for the election victory .
  5. ^ The Guardian : Afghan president Hamid Karzai picks ex-warlord as election running mate on May 4, 2009 (accessed August 18, 2009).
  6. ↑ Stern : Balm for Wounds that have never healed, August 17, 2009 (accessed August 18, 2009).
  7. ↑ Süddeutsche Zeitung : Cooled affection ( memento of the original from June 1, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.sueddeutsche.de archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. of March 9, 2009 (accessed on August 18, 2009).
  8. ↑ Die Welt : Afghanistan's Tense Waiting for the August 17, 2009 election (accessed August 18, 2009).
  9. ↑ Die Welt : Taliban confess to attack in Kabul on August 15, 2009 (accessed on August 18, 2009).
  10. ↑ Die Welt : Missile attack on the Presidential Palace in Kabul on August 18, 2009 (accessed on August 18, 2009).
  11. ↑ Die Welt : Taliban want to “cut off fingers” from voters on August 17, 2009 (accessed on August 18, 2009).
  12. ↑ Die Presse : Afghanistan: Voting Despite Terror and Censorship ( Memento of August 28, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) of August 19, 2009.
  13. ↑ a b Basler Zeitung : Karzai's opponent is catching up on August 14, 2009 (accessed on August 18, 2009).
  14. ↑ Salzburger Nachrichten : Karzai relies on clans and warlords from August 14, 2009 (accessed April 24, 2017).
  15. ↑ a b Die Welt : In Afghanistan, millions of voters defy the violence of August 21, 2009 (accessed on August 21, 2009).
  16. ↑ a b Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung : Millions of Afghans defy the Taliban from August 20, 2009 (accessed on August 21, 2009).
  17. ^ A b Neue Zürcher Zeitung : Election fraud in Afghanistan of August 23, 2009 (accessed on August 23, 2009).
  18. ^ Neue Zürcher Zeitung : Karzai and Abdullah declared themselves the winners on August 21, 2009 (accessed on August 21, 2009).
  19. ↑ Focus : Head-to-head race between Karzai and Abdullah from August 25, 2009 (accessed on August 25, 2009).
  20. ↑ cf. dpa : Conflicts: Karzai continues to extend the lead over Abdullah at zeit.de, August 6, 2009 (accessed on August 7, 2009)
  21. ↑ Tagesschau : In 2500 polling stations will be counted again ( Memento from September 22, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) from September 15, 2009 (accessed on September 16, 2009).
  22. ↑ Tagesschau : Possibly 1.5 million votes forged ( memento from September 22, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) from September 16, 2009 (accessed on September 16, 2009).
  23. ^ Hamburger Abendblatt : UN: "Significant" electoral fraud in Afghanistan of October 12, 2009 (accessed on October 20, 2009).
  24. ↑ Die Welt : Absolute majority for Karzai - provisional from September 17, 2009 (accessed September 17).
  25. ↑ Die Presse : Afghanistan election: Hundreds of thousands of votes invalid from October 19, 2009 (accessed October 20, 2009).
  26. ^ Tagesschau : Karzai has to go to the runoff election ( memento of October 22, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) of October 20, 2009 (accessed on October 20, 2009).
  27. ^ Spiegel Online : US top diplomat calls for UN intervention against election fraud on October 17, 2009 (accessed October 20, 2009).
  28. ↑ Focus : Abdullah Abdullah sets conditions from October 26, 2009 (accessed November 1, 2009).
  29. ^ Die Welt : Karzai is planning the runoff election on November 1, 2009 , despite the Abdullah boycott (accessed November 1, 2009).
  30. ↑ Tagesschau : Karzai remains president ( Memento from November 4, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) from November 2, 2009 (accessed on November 2, 2009).
  31. ↑ Die Welt : Hamid Karzai sworn in for a second term on November 19, 2009 (accessed November 19, 2009).