Nobody wins in the Afghan runoff election..

The UN seemed to back Karzai for some while until it became clear that there were just too many of his votes to be discarded and no doubt because of pressure from the US and Abdullah Abdullah to have a runoff. However, as this article points out the runoff election creates more problems than it will likely solve. Even if the election is reasonably fair and Abdullah Abdullah should win which is probably the best outcome as seen by many in the west it would actually be a disaster unless some way is found to accomodate the Pashtuns. Otherwise the country will be even more divided.

There is little time to organise this election and many areas of the country will virtually be off limits because of Taliban control. If the weather is bad there will be even less turnout. An election that is not held in many parts of the country and with poor turnout in areas where there is voting will hardly give much legitimacy to the Afghan govt. My own view is that this election has very little to do with creating a legitimate govt. in Afghan eyes but one that is legitimate in the eyes of those who are footing the bill for the election, security, and most else that happens in Afghanistan, the taxpayers of the US and participating NATO countries.

Nobody wins in the Afghan runoff election
No matter how the Nov. 7 vote turns out, it likely will impede the goal of creating an effective, independent government in Kabul.
By Rajan Menon

October 21, 2009

Politicians love photo-ops. So when Sen. John KerryJohn Kerry (D-Mass.) appeared alongside Hamid KarzaiHamid Karzai as the beleaguered Afghan president announced that he would agree to a runoff election, it was hardly surprising. Kerry was doing what politicians do.

Moreover, the senator was in Kabul to supplement the Obama administration's efforts to lean on Karzai to hold another presidential vote, given widespread evidence that the one held in August was rigged. When Karzai claimed victory then, his main opponent, former Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah, cried foul, a chorus of international criticism arose and an Afghan government infamous for its ineptitude and sleaziness looked even more illegitimate.

It's this tricky context that makes Kerry's photo-op problematic.

The Obama administration knows that no amount of firepower in the war will substitute for an Afghan government that is minimally effective, has the confidence of its people and is seen as independent. The Taliban knows this as well, which is why, in addition to mounting an insurgency and launching suicide bombings, it has been busy painting the Americans as occupiers and Karzai as their puppet. The spectacle of the 6-foot-tall U.S. senator standing next to the Afghan president, who everyone knows was arm-twisted into making a concession he had resisted, simply helps the Taliban's PR campaign.

The runoff is to be held on Nov. 7 -- that's less than three weeks from now. Organizing it that quickly would be hard even for an honest and efficient government. But the Afghan government is an amalgam of consummate crookedness and incompetence. The first attribute means that the same dishonest impulses that led it to cheat in the August election will tempt it to steal the vote in the runoff -- and to parry the ensuing criticism by arguing that Karzai went the extra mile by agreeing to a second round in a vote that he had rightfully won in the first.

........

It's a sure bet that the Taliban, true to form, will warn voters to stay at home during the vote on pain of death, and try to kill those who are not intimidated. It has become a formidable force and is no longer confined to its Pashtun strongholds in the south and east. This raises the question of how the country can be made safe enough to ensure a reasonable turnout.

A vote in which few take part and many that do are killed or maimed will hardly enable American soldiers to convince ordinary Afghans that they are capable of protecting them from the Taliban. But winning the confidence of Afghans on this very point is pivotal to McChrystal's strategy.

What about a surprising outcome: a fair vote that is won by Abdullah? That denouement would cashier the Karzai government for sure, but it would also make an old problem much worse. Abdullah is a Tajik, and tensions among Tajiks, Pashtuns, Uzbeks and Hazaras have long been part of Afghanistan's politics. The Pashtuns have dominated the country's politics (Karzai is a Pashtun, and the Taliban is overwhelmingly Pashtun) and will not meekly hand over the reins of power -- the stakes are too high. Instead, they will resist, and Afghanistan's ethnic divisions will deepen.

....Rajan Menon is a professor of international relations at Lehigh University.