Afghans vote to elect new president
Kabul: Afghans votes on Saturday to elect a successor to President Hamid Karzai in the country’s first democratic transfer of power as US-led forces wind down their 13-year war.
A blast killed one person and wounded two others at a school being used as a polling station in Logar province, south of Kabul, district chief Abdul Hameed Hamid Mohammad Agha said.
In Kabul, hit by a series of deadly attacks during the election campaign, hundreds of people lined up in the open air to vote despite the insurgents’ promise of violence.
“I’m not afraid of Taliban threats, we will die one day anyway. I want my vote to be a slap in the face of the Taliban,” housewife Laila Neyazi, 48, said.
Poll security was a major concern following the attacks in Kabul, most recently a suicide bombing on Wednesday that killed six police officers.
Interior Minister Omar Daudzai said all 400,000 of Afghanistan’s police, army and intelligence services were being deployed to ensure security around the country.
Afghans have taken over responsibility for security from US-led forces and this year the last of the NATO coalition’s 51,000 combat troops will pull out, leaving local forces to battle the resilient Taliban insurgency without their help.
In the western city of Herat, a queue of several hundred people waited to vote at one polling station, while in Jalalabad in the east, voters stood patiently outside a mosque.
Voters also lined up in Kandahar city, the southern heartland of the Taliban, with some women among the crowd in contrast to the 2009 election when turnout was very low due to poor security.
After casting his vote in a school near the presidential palace in Kabul, Karzai said, “I cast my vote, I feel happy and proud as a citizen of Afghanistan. Today is an important day for our future, the future of our country. I urge the Afghan nation to go to the polling station despite the rain, cold weather and enemy threats… and to take the country another step towards success.”
Karzai has vowed to stay neutral in the election and oversee a free and fair vote, despite allegations of massive fraud in the 2009 poll when he retained power after a long and disputed process.
The President, who has ruled since the fall of the Taliban in 2001, says he will live as a private citizen in Afghanistan after leaving the palace, but he is expected to retain extensive political influence.
The country’s third presidential election brings an end to 13 years of rule by Karzai, who has held power since the Taliban were ousted in 2001.
