“The Taliban has cancelled it out, they forced people to remain in their homes,” he said, adding the legitimacy of the final result “is put in question.”
He said the slow release of the results should give Karzai time to cut a compromise with Abdullah.
“We could end up with a power-sharing situation,” he said. “It is segregated — Abdullah in the north, Karzai in the south.”
“This election has shown that Afghanistan remains strictly divided,” he said, adding: “We are heading for political crisis.”
As the number of complaints — 790 on polling day alone — was being used by Abdullah to lambast the whole process as fraudulent in favor of his opponent, ordinary Afghans said they expected problems.
“There is no doubt that there would be a lot of fraud but a lot of the people I know and work with said they were supporting Karzai,” said 28-year-old Kabul telecommunications engineer Mohammad Akbar.
Time spent waiting for the results was “extremely boring,” he said, but added: “There is a lot of concern and worry that when the election result becomes final, whether or not it will be accepted.”
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