Karzai’s poll lead reveals ethnic divide

The vote count so far in Afghanistan’s first direct Presidential election, while giving the incumbent Hamid Karzai a formidable lead, has also underscored the ethnic faultlines that divide the country.

Of the nearly 40 per cent of the votes from the October 9 poll counted, Karzai held a commanding 63.1 per cent, on course to become the country’s first democratically elected leader. But while he has swept the ballot in provinces dominated by the majority Pashtun group, Karzai has fared badly in areas where ethnic minorities hold sway.

He has captured nearly 90 per cent of the votes in southern and eastern Pashtun provinces, but in the northern Panjsher valley—heartland of the resistance against the Soviet occupation — he has managed to get just 367 votes of the nearly 48,000 cast. Election officials said today that although it was possible to determine a winner before the final tally, a formal announcement would only come after a report by a panel investigating allegations of election fraud. — Reuters