Word: turnout
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...participate at all in the election process could help legitimize the new political order in Afghanistan - which may be precisely why the Taliban is waging a campaign of violence and intimidation to keep people away from the polls on Thursday. For the Taliban, the optimal outcome is a low turnout producing a new wave of turmoil that further undermines the legitimacy of the government in Kabul...
...efforts for much of this year, deflecting from undertaking the development and reconstruction work deemed critical to the success of the counterinsurgency campaign. And even then, with the Taliban posing an active threat to polling in almost half of the country, there's a real danger of a turnout too low to legitimize the election. "If it's under 30%, there will be appeals by almost everyone to say that this is not a legitimate election, and that we'll need another election," Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid, who has written two authoritative books on the Taliban, told the Council...
...after serving two years as interim leader, Ahmadi remembers thousands of voters showing up at the very same station, which is a mosque perched on a hill with a commanding view of the city. "This time there is no one," he says. But he doesn't blame the low turnout on insecurity alone. "Over the past seven years, people have become disappointed with democracy. They don't see that it has made their lives any better." (See pictures of Afghanistan's dangerous Korengal Valley...
...threats suppress voter turnout among the Pashtuns of the south, who make up 40% of the population, they could undercut the legitimacy of the election. It would spell trouble for President Hamid Karzai, who is still the favorite, though he is trying to avoid a troublesome runoff with Abdullah Abdullah, the former Foreign Minister and Northern Alliance candidate whose campaign has gained momentum of late. If southern voters stay home in large enough numbers, say analysts, there is a slight but not impossible scenario that northern voters could dictate the election's outcome in favor of Abdullah, further destabilizing...
...stated intent is to avoid civilian casualties in order to cast in sharper relief U.S. culpability for the deaths of Afghans in errant air strikes and night raids. (Insurgents have been responsible for 60% of civilian deaths so far this year, according to U.N. figures.) If there is lackluster turnout in Kandahar, he says, it really means that people are "fed up with a government that has broken too many promises." (See pictures of the battle against the Taliban...