Soc 313-003 Panel Orders Recount as Tally Gives Karzai 54%

Stacy Lunsford
Soc 313-003
09/08/09
Blog Post #1

Panel Orders Recount as Tally Gives Karzai 54%

In Kabul, Afghanistan the United Nations claimed to have found clear evidence of fraud in many of the polling stations in the recent presidential elections. Even though current president, Hamid Karzai, won the majority vote, the UN has ordered a partial recount of the votes. About 90% of the polling stations have been counted with Karzai winning 54% of the majority vote. The challanger, former foreign minister, Abdullah Abdullah won around 28 % of the vote. These figures seem to be in doubt with international elected officials, which claimed that these tallies included thousands of questionable votes that could be discounted if Afghan officials had used safeguards built into the computerized counting system. According to a anonymous diplomat, Karzai wouldn't have received at least 50% of the vote if the correct computerized safeguards had been in place. A decision was made Sunday by Afghan officials to enforce certain algorithms that would catch irregularities where there was higher than the expected number of voters recorded or if there was a candidate who won largely. When this proved that Karzai wouldn't get at least 50% of the vote, officials reversed the decision. Other opposing candidates including, Abdullah Abdullah, have accused the Karzai government of voting fraud. The Electorial Complaints Commission, made up ofAfghani and international officials, said that they have found a pattern of fraud and are investigating the southern and eastern provinces. The ECC said that the ballot boxes were tainted by: being stuffed with high number of presidential votes in relation to the number of ballots available and by the high percentage number of votes cast for one or both of the candidates with Karzai winning a large number of votes in certain areas. The ECC is now ordering recounts of all polling stations where over 600 votes were cast. This recount is expected to takes weeks.

I think this is a perfect example of social control. Those who have power want to keep there power and will possibly do anything to keep it and because of this Afghanistan is a country that right now doesn't have a leader thats been voted on by the people and accepted. Now there are accusations by opposing candidates of voting fraud. I think this is a good example of Marx's conflict theory because essentially the Afghan people have the power decide who their president is by voting, but then they really don't because those higher up with more power have the ability to swing the election the way that they need it to be. Its like the haves and the have-nots, everyone is struggling for power.
Citation:
http//www.nytimes.com/2009/09/09/world/asia/09afghan.html?hp