Presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah demanded on Monday the firing of Afghanistan's Independent Election Commission (IEC) chief and suspension of three cabinet ministers ahead of a run-off poll. Abdullah called for the "immediate dismissal" of Azizullah Ludin and his replacement with another member of the IEC, which critics slammed as biased in favour of President Hamid Karzai during fraud-tainted August elections.
While Abdullah would not spell out the consequences if Ludin and the ministers stayed in place, one of his closest supporters said there was a strong likelihood that he would boycott the November 7 run-off. "He has left no credibility for the institution," Abdullah told reporters of Ludin in his strongest attack so far on the IEC's controversial chairman.
"What's the solution? Another commissioner from the same commission should take his position," the former foreign minister said. The IEC is a nominally independent body but its members were appointed by Karzai. Ludin is a former presidential advisor. Abdullah has repeatedly called for a shake-up of the IEC after a separate UN-backed commission rejected around a quarter of the votes from the August 20 first round because of fraud.
Ludin's position was contentious even before the first round, with leading US rights group Human Rights Watch warning that the IEC's institutional pro-Karzai bias meant "that the playing field for all candidates is not level, undermining the extent to which these elections will be seen as fair".
In the wake of the fraud revelations, UN chief Ban Ki-moon said that around 200 IEC field officers would be replaced for the second round. Abdullah said that his call for a new IEC head rather than for a whole new commission was a "practical, technical" solution given that the run-off is less than two weeks away. He also called for the suspension of cabinet ministers whom he accused of breaching rules of impartiality by stumping for votes for Karzai, identifying the interior, education and tribal affairs ministers.
So-called ghost polling stations - where security was so fragile they did not open but nevertheless returned huge numbers of ballots - should not open this time round, he added.
Abdullah said his demands were the "minimum" needed for a fair second round. "With the implementation of these conditions, we have a chance for the people of Afghanistan... to exercise their will in a better environment." Ahmad Behzad, a pro-Abdullah lawmaker who campaigned for him in the first round, said the candidate was paving the way to pull out of the contest if he felt it remained tilted in Karzai's favour.
"I think the conditions set and spelled out by Dr Abdullah today are the minimum possible conditions and the practical ones," Behzad told AFP. "Unless these conditions are met, holding a transparent, just and free election is not possible. "If these conditions are not met, it means that Karzai once again wants to organise a fraudulent election and I think going to such an election is not wise. "If the conditions are not met, there is a big possibility of a boycott by Dr Abdullah." There was no immediate reaction to Abdullah's calls from the Karzai camp.