Afghan Electoral Commission Denies Confirming Victory Claims

Electoral officials say the ballot counting is now over and the official result will be announced soon, but warned against predicting the outcome. Photo by BGNES

The two leading contenders for Afghanistan's presidential election have both claimed victory, even though the Electoral Commission cannot confirm any result yet.

The campaign teams for incumbent, Hamid Karzai, and ex-Foreign Minister, Abdullah Abdullah, both said they had won an outright majority, the BBC reported.

Electoral officials say the ballot counting is now over and the official result will be announced soon, but warned against predicting the outcome.

Deen Mohammad, the campaign chief for Hamid Karzai, said they predicted victory after reports from nearly 29 000 monitors they had at polling stations across the country.

Fazl Sangcharaki, a spokesman for Abdullah Abdullah, said the results from his observers at polling booths around the country suggested Abdullah Abdullah had won 63% of the vote to Hamid Karzai's 31%.

Afghan election officials refused to confirm either candidates' claims. Instead, they asked the campaign teams to refrain from speculating on the results.

Official results had not been expected for a couple of weeks, but the Afghan Election Commission confirmed on Friday that ballot counting was over for the presidential election in all parts of the country.

 

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