VZCZCXRO3465
PP RUEHPW
DE RUEHBUL #3190/01 3460820
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 110820Z DEC 08
FM AMEMBASSY KABUL
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 6382
INFO RUCNAFG/AFGHANISTAN COLLECTIVE PRIORITY

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 KABUL 003190 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR SCA/FO, SCA/A, S/CRS 
STATE PASS TO USAID FOR AID/ANE, AID/DCHA/DG 
NSC FOR JWOOD 
OSD FOR MCGRAW 
CG CJTF-101, POLAD, JICCENT 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: KDEM PGOV AF
SUBJECT: UNDERSTANDING IRREGULARITIES IN VOTER REGISTRATION 
 
REF: KABUL 3106 
 
¶1.  (SBU)  By December 13, 24 of Afghanistan's 34 provinces 
will have completed the voter registration update  exercise. 
To date, observed irregularities and partisan quibbles alike 
revolve around the politically-sensitive question of Pashtun 
participation.  This dynamic makes Phases 3 and 4, in the 
remaining ten provinces in the Pashtun-dominated east and 
south, a bellwether for popular acceptance of the electoral 
process as legitimate. 
 
-------------- 
SMALL LIES ... 
-------------- 
 
¶2.  (SBU)  UN election staff consider fraud to date in voter 
registration quite limited, with reported cases appearing in 
only Logar and Paktya, two of the 24 provinces of Phase 1 and 
Phase 2.  As reported reftel, UNAMA field officers cite 
credible reports that in these provinces, where Pashtun 
tribes dominate, men provided lists of women's names to 
registration workers and received voter cards in return. The 
women never appeared at the registration site to prove their 
identity or provide fingerprints. The numbers of new women 
voters in Logar and Paktya are anomalous, with rates running 
at over 60 percent of total new registrants.  UN political 
experts are studying the data and will forward their 
conclusions to the Independent Elections Commission (IEC.) 
 
¶3.  (SBU)  The coalition of Afghan NGOs observing the 
process, FEFA, has some 350 observers on the ground and 
presented similar conclusions in its December 6 press 
conference.  FEFA described voter registration as successful 
and sound overall.  Its observers reported the following 
types of fraud and procedural flaws, in descending frequency: 
registration of voters under 18; multiple registrations; 
distribution of blank registration forms; and issuance of 
cards intended for wives to their husbands, as above.  Very 
rarely, FEFA observed partisan bias among registration staff. 
The IEC conducted self-monitoring missions in Kabul, Balkh, 
Kunduz, Baghlan, and Samangan provinces, but these 
conclusions are not yet known. 
 
¶4.  (SBU)  The observed and reported voter registration fraud 
in itself will have little or no impact on the outcome of the 
election. The key safeguards on election day against multiple 
voting are the integrity of polling center staff and the use 
of indelible ink.  For voters to use multiple cards as an 
excuse to conduct multiple or proxy voting, as occurred in 
2005, polling center staff must acquiesce in de-linking one 
voter, one card, one vote. As for stuffing ballot boxes and 
fudging vote counts, the IEC is leaning toward counting votes 
at polling centers, which will provide the detailed results 
data that itself exposes such attempts at fraud. 
 
 
----------------- 
...AND STATISTICS 
----------------- 
 
¶5.  (SBU)  Mark Twain's quip, "There are three kinds of lies: 
lies, damn lies, and statistics," applies to the problem of 
gauging the number of Pashtun voters and their participation 
in the electoral process.  The government's Central 
Statistics Office has not conducted a recent census and even 
overall population estimates are shaky. The population 
density map most used by US forces, for example, shows a 
crisp line along the famously porous southern border with 
Pakistan, reflecting incomplete underlying data for 
Afghanistan.  The Afghan national identification card does 
record ethnic identity, but many citizens do not have this 
document.  The IEC does not indicate ethnic identity on voter 
registration cards nor keep any record of a registrant's 
claimed ethnicity.  Thus, no one knows how many Pashtuns 
reside in the country, how many Pashtuns are of voting age, 
or how many Pashtuns have or will obtain voter registration 
cards.  Even data to make reliable estimates do not exist. 
 
¶6.  (SBU)  A lack of useful information has not kept various 
commentators from dark speculations about possible Pashtun 
disenfranchisement.  Some are spuriously specific, citing 
totals and percentages, and others rely on geography as a 
proxy to ethnicity, tagging certain districts or provinces as 
wholly Pashtun.  The accounts of these analysts seem to track 
most closely with political predilection and ethnic identity. 
 Ghazni and Herat, for example, both contain a mix of ethnic 
 
KABUL 00003190  002 OF 002 
 
 
populations.  A Pashtun political observer in Kabul, however, 
recently opined that Ghazni's security problems 
disenfranchised Pashtuns exclusively, while Herat's 
relatively low participation in the voter update reflected a 
disproportionately large baseline number of registered Tajiks 
and Hazaras. 
 
¶7.  (SBU)  President Karzai has been especially focused on 
the conduct of voter registration, and ultimately the 
election, in Helmand province.  He views the credibility of 
the election overall through the lens of how the process is 
conducted in Helmand.  In fact, in the 2004 election, Helmand 
comprised only 3.6 percent of the overall vote in the 
country, and 6 percent of Karzai's total vote.  In contrast, 
the much smaller Nangarhar province, which is also 
predominately Pashtun, comprised 10 percent of Karzai's 
overall votes. 
 
¶8.  (SBU)  Perception, therefore, is key to popular 
acceptance of the electoral process as legitimate.  Voter 
registration in the predominately Pashtun areas of the east 
and south, in Phases 3 and 4, will for many serve as a 
barometer of Pashtun participation overall.  If the process 
goes smoothly in larger population centers, such as Lashkar 
Gah, Kandahar city, and Tarin Kowt, and takes place at all in 
the sparsely-populated rural and desert regions, many will 
accept that fairness is at play. 
DELL