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The day after the vote

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Millions of Afghans cast their ballots in yesterday’s presidential election…though turnout appeared weaker than in the election five years ago. Anchor Katy Clark speaks with the BBC’s Caroline Wyatt about the mood today in Helmand province as Afghans wait for the results of the vote.

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KATY CLARK: I’m Katy Clark and this is The World. It will be a few days before we have even preliminary results of yesterday’s presidential election in Afghanistan. But who won is in some ways less important than the fact that the election took place at all. Millions of Afghans defied threats to cast their ballots. That was the good news. The bad news was that turnout appeared weaker then the previous presidential election five years ago and at least 26 Afghans were killed in election related violence. The BBC’s Caroline Wyatt is in the southwestern Afghan province of Helmand. And Caroline yesterday you told us how voters went to the poles despite the background of violence and intimidation but how was turnout overall in Helmand?

Caroline Wyatt: Very difficult to say. We haven’t had the actual figures yet. We’ve been told by the election commission that overall they believe that between 40% and 50% of people across country turned out to vote. We’ve heard one estimate here of turnout in the rural parts of Helmand as being something like 8%. That again though would not necessarily be surprising. A lot of these areas have only very recently been won back from the Taliban and the campaign of intimidation I think would have been much more effective in small villages where everyone knows everyone and it would be very hard to hide an ink-stained finger showing you had voted. So not clear yet. We’ve seen ballot boxes being brought back by British and American helicopters here in Lashkar Gah. The ones coming back from the town Sangin for example looked very indeed. Again a suggestion not many had voted there but that again is a place still under pretty major Taliban influence.

CLARK: Well on the subject of voter turnout, Human Rights Watch is estimating a very low turnout across the south and the east and we have a bit of tape here from the lead researcher for Human Rights Watch in Kabul, Rachel Reid. Let’s play that now.

RACHEL REID: Some of the early indicators I’m getting, in the south, the south east, central regions and in the east – almost half the country – we’re looking at very turnout, significant numbers of attacks, high levels of intimidation. Even if the Taliban didn’t intend to kill many people, they certainly seemed intent on scaring people away from the polling stations. So I’m getting indications that turnout may have been as low as 30% or even lower in many of those areas.

CLARK: Caroline I’m wondering if there is indeed a low turnout could that undermine the credibility of this election?

WYATT: Depends on what expectations were – how high they were pitched. And also how the Afghan people react to them when they come out. And I think if Afghans by and large accept the elections were as free as fair as they could have been then it doesn’t actually matter whether turnout was 20%, 30%, 10%, 40%. It’s not really the turnout that matters so much as people’s response to it, whether anyone feels that the votes were stolen.

CLARK: Are you hearing any particular complaints about some irregularities at the polling places?

WYATT: Oh yes. There has been very lively debate and discussion on Afghan television, Afghan radio. A lot of different stories coming out there about places where people did see ballot stuffing; places where underage voters may have been allowed to vote. Other places where we heard of it ourselves in Lashkar Gah, election agents had been in either buying or selling votes in some of the polling stations and also a colleague of mine was talking to someone who said warlords up in the north where he was had sent people to vote for the people they told them to. While not surprising behavior for a warlord perhaps in Afghanistan. So these are not elections necessarily being carried out under the standards you might expect in places that have had democracy for longer. It has been very rough and ready. But again it depends on what people expected in Afghanistan. I don’t know that their expectations were that high to begin with. I think people will accept a certain amount of roughness around the edges here.

CLARK: Well the poll I guess itself is really just the beginning isn’t it? I mean now comes the counting part. President Obama’s special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke, told the New York Times today that the test is going to be in the counting. If the will of the elector it is going to be thwarted it will happen in the counting. What kind of precautions are being taken there to make sure that there is no tinkering with that?

WYATT: As far as we can see the process seems to be pretty well organized. Certainly here in Helmand where you’ve had Americans and British getting involved in transporting the ballot boxes. They appear to be sealed. There are election officials with them. And then at the other end when they’re taking them off there should not be a chance for anyone to tamper with them. Of course we haven’t been able to see what goes on at the actual places where the election took place and a lot of those are very rural areas. But the people there were appointed by the Afghan election commission. I presume they simply have to trust the many employed people that they’ve trusted. What happens with the ballots after this, during that count, very difficult to say again how that process will happen – whether people will feel that their vote was fairly reflected. At the moment you have two candidates both claiming victory and I presume that the count – when it comes out – will tell us who has won or whether it does have to go to a rather difficult second round.

CLARK: The BBC’s Caroline Wyatt speaking with us from a British military base in Afghanistan’s Helmand province. Thank you.

WYATT: Thank you.

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