09 October 2004	Saturday	23 Shaban 1425

PESHAWAR, Oct 8: Out of 16 candidates in the field, at least three can cause some damage to President Hamid Karzai's chances in the first-ever presidential election in the war-ravaged country.

Millions of Afghans are expected to turn up for voting today (Saturday) at 4,800 polling stations set up in the country for which 30,000 ballot boxes have been distributed through helicopters, trucks, jeeps, boats as well as donkeys.

After the polling, the ballot boxes would be transported back to eight regional centres in Kabul, Kandahar, Mazar-i-Sharif, Jalalabad, Gardez, Kunduz, Bamiyan and Herat through the same mode of transport. The whole exercise has cost $120 million.

The joint electoral management body, which oversees the election process, has stated the ballot boxes would be transported back to the regional centres and the complete counting of votes take about three weeks.

A resident of Kabul said that only a few people had ventured out in the streets of the Afghan capital on Friday, betraying the underlying fear of possible attacks by the Taliban to disrupt the elections.

The government on its part has stepped up security, particularly in Kabul ahead of the elections. About 400 big buses and 600 mini-buses would provide free transport to voters but other than that no truck or any other vehicle would be allowed to enter the city.

Also, about 48,000 soldiers of the Afghan National Army supported by 25,000 US-led foreign troops and 17,000-strong Afghan police would provide security during the day-long voting. But even then President Karzai and other candidates would have to do their best to avoid run-off polls, for which a candidate is required to get more than 50 per cent of the total votes cast.

Independent polls forecast an easy win for the 46-year-old incumbent president, but his opponents have accused him and his major rival Younis Qanuni of using state resources for polls.

The Asia Foundation in its pre-poll nation wide survey conducted in late September said that nearly two-thirds (62 per cent) of the Afghans believed that Mr Karzai was doing a 'good' or 'excellent' job as president.

Interestingly, however, it would be three of Mr Karzai's former colleagues who could undermine his votes in the largely non-Pushtun north and northwest areas of the country.

According to the Asia Foundation's poll, the president's popularity is quite low in these areas. Seventy per cent of those asked in the northwest of the country rated Mr Karzai's performance as poor.

One of his main challengers, former education minister Younis Qanuni, is ethnic Tajik from village Shigha in the Punjshir Valley. A veteran of the Afghan war and politics, Mr Qanuni belongs to the so-called Punjshiri group that also includes Defence Minister Mohammad Qasim Fahim and Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah.