The Independent Election Commission (IEC) will start work on election plans once budget and constituency issues have been resolved, IEC commissioner Maazullah Dawlati told TOLOnews on Saturday.
“We will start our action plans once we are assured about budget issues and to some extent about security issues,” he said.
“Discussions between government and international organizations including UNAMA are ongoing in order to encourage them to convince donor countries to finalize a budget [for the IEC],” he added.
The IEC said two proposals have been submitted to government. One is on the issue of funding of the budget and the second is on the constituency issue.
The constituency proposal is aimed at breaking up some provincial constituencies into smaller ones.
For example the plan is to break up Kabul into five constituencies and Herat into three. Ten other provinces would be broken up into two and the remaining provinces will remain one provincial constituency.
Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah’s office said assessments by government of the IEC’s proposals will take some time.
“Any decision which is taken is the authority of the IEC. Government is taking part in this process only as a bystander,” the CEO’s deputy spokesman Jawed Faisal said.
However, the ongoing delay in setting a date for elections has drawn harsh criticism.
“The international community and donor countries for sure will make a final decision on elections if government puts aside its political disputes and supports the [election] process,” said Hekmatullah Shahbaz, a university lecturer.
This comes after reports indicate that a three-member delegation, including two foreign representatives, will assess the digitization proposal of elections in the near future.
According to the IEC, the delegation will share its findings with the commission within two weeks.
Two proposals pending – one is funding of the budget – and the second is to introduce a system to fragment provincial constituencies into smaller one. For example Kabul into five, Herat 3, ten other provinces each with two and the remaining provinces will remain one provincial constituency.