First Reactions Negative: The new Electoral Complaints
Commission
Author : Gran Hewad
Published: 18 September 2013
Downloaded: 6 October 2016
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The presidential palace has announced the names of the five members of the
Independent Electoral Complaints Commission (IECC), the body which will deal with any
complaints about the April 2014 presidential election. It will also, along with the
Independent Election Commission (IEC), rule whether the ballot was free and fair. The
commissioners are Abdul Sattar Sadat, Rida Azimi, Nader Mohseni, Azizullah Aryafar and
Payghambar Qul Doghan. As AAN researcher Gran Hewad reports, the five are
reasonably qualified professionally, but there are allegations that they are too close to
the Palace and the current, but out-going, vice presidents.
The president selected the five out of a shortlist of 15, with the announcement being made on
16 September 2013.(1) The five have a range of reasonably relevant professional qualifications,
with, between them, experience in the law, journalism, academia, the Senate, district governing
and the civil service. However, as various opposition figures have pointed out, they also all have
links to the Palace. "We don't expect they will properly scrutinise allegations of electoral fraud,"
Hussain Sancharaki, spokesman for 2009 presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah told
Reuters. Speaking to the same agency, the Kandahar MP Naim Lalai Hamidzai said, "The
president obviously chose his own people, those loyal to his circle."
The head of the watchdog NGO Free and Fair Election Foundation of Afghanistan, Jandad
Spinghar, has said they are also concerned about alleged deals made during the selection
process and what they believe is the weakness of the IECC as a result. (See earlier AAN
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reporting on the selection process here.)
Given the history of vote rigging and fraud in previous Afghan elections and the politicised
tussles to get clear and accepted results in both the last previous parliamentary and presidential
elections, the IECC matters.
The five new commissioners are:
Abdul Sattar Saadat: legal advisor to the office of the president. Saadat is also still a member
of the Afghan Lawyers Association, a public commentator and a member of the Civil Society
Coordination Jirga.
Rida Azemi: journalist by profession, she was appointed a senator by Karzai for the period from
2005 to 2010. After completing her term, he appointed her an IEC commissioner, a position she
enjoyed until late July when, as per the law, new commissioners were appointed to the IEC.
Nader Mohseni: has an MA in law and is head of the Asset Registration Unit of the High Office
of Oversight and Anti-Corruption. He is a member of the political committee of Hezb-e Wahdat
Islami led by Second Vice President Abdul Karim Khalili and is said to be close to the Director
General of the Office of Administrative Affairs, which is based in the Palace, Dr Sadeq
Mudabber.
Azizullah Aryafar: journalist by profession and working as head of the Public Relations
Department of the Independent Administrative Reform and Civil Services Commission.
Previously, he was director of National Radio TV. Aryafar worked in a small media unit which
supported Ahmad Shah Massud and which, later, during the Taleban years, became Aria Press,
operating out of Dushanbe as a cultural support unit, producing multimedia products for the
Northern Alliance. He is said to be close to the first vice president.
Paighambar Qul Doghan: historian by profession and currently the district governor of the
Qurghan district of Faryab province. At 59, he will be due to retire two years before completing
his six year term with IECC. A source who worked on preparing the selection files told AAN
Doghan is known to be close to Minister of Refugees and Repatriation Jamahir Anwari.
(1) President Karzai selected the five names from 15 introduced to him on 11 September 2013
by a Selection Committee (for reporting, see here; for AAN background on the procedures, see
here). The 15 names were supposed to have been sent on 19 August, but according to staff on
the secretariat of the Selection Committee, the committee had wanted to really scrutinise the
applicants’ documents and this had taken time.
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