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A core component of Democracy International's mission is the record of events that our field observers witness at polling centers on election day and in the run-up to the vote. To better visualize and share this data, DI has launched a new project in conjunction with Small World News and Ushahidi.

KABUL, Sept 17 - The single non-transferable vote (SNTV) system used in Afghanistan's elections can produce a wide range of vote spreads, the difference of votes earned between the candidates winning seats.  

In the 2005 election for Afghanistan's lower house of parliament, the Wolesi Jirga, some of the vote spreads were very wide, such as in Kabul, where the difference between the top vote earner and the lowest successful candidate was 50,646 votes.  

KABUL, Sept 12 - Accusations of widespread fraud and electoral mismanagement marred the conduct of Afghanistan’s Presidential and Provincial Council elections in September 2009. In advance of the upcoming elections for Afghanistan's lower house of parliament, the Wolesi Jirga, what is the Independent Election Commission (IEC) doing to deter fraud in Afghanistan's first fully locally-led electoral process? Democracy International has identified a number of operational reforms undertaken by the IEC in its preparation for the upcoming vote, outlined in the video below.

As we've noted before in previous analysis, one effect of the Single-Non Transferable Vote system, used in all of Afghanistan's parliamentary elections to date, is that candidates often win with very small shares of the vote in their respective provinces, since voters only receive one ballot for a multi-member constituency and coordinated party voting is very difficult.