ECC Annuls All Votes for Herat Mayor’s Brother

Kabul, Oct 13 - The Electoral Complaints Commission has annulled all the votes cast in the province of Herat for the brother of Herat’s mayor, Muhammad Salim Taraki, and filed a formal complaint against the mayor with the attorney general.

ECC spokesperson, Ahmad Zia Rafat, told a press conference Wednesday that all the votes cast in all of the polling centers of Herat province for Muhammad Halim Taraki have been annulled by the ECC. Mr. Taraki, a candidate in September 18 parliamentary elections, is the brother of Muhammad Salim Taraki, the mayor of Herat.

Muhammad Halim Taraki has apparently used government resources in his favor, the ECC spokesman said. The ECC has formally filed complaints against Muhammad Salim Taraki, the mayor of Herat, to the office of Attorney General. Mr. Rafat said that it was entirely possible that there might be more cases like this that all votes of other candidates too might be cancelled due to serious electoral irregularities.

The ECC has cancelled votes casted in 69 polling centers that include 220 polling stations. 2 of these centers are in Faryab, 12 in Khost, 1 in Logar, 2 in Nangarhar, 7 in Paktia, 32 in Paktika, 4 in Zabul, 3 in Oruzgan, and 5 in Badakhshan.

Mr. Rafat announced that the ECC has received 4,385 complaints so far. The ECC has evaluated and categorized 4,177 of these complaints. 55 percent of the complaints have been categorized as A level. 31 percent of the complaints have been categorized as B level. And 14 percent of the complaints have been categorized as C level.

Furthermore, Mr. Rafat stated that there are also some complaints that the IEC staff has been involved in electoral irregularities. The ECC would make decisions in this regard and would make them public in the coming days.