Heartening News, if Not an April Fool’s Joke

Jonathan Partow of the Washington Post reports from Kabul that the lower house of Aghanistan’s National Assembly has rejected Hamid Karzai’s attempt to seize control of the Electoral Complaints Commission. Partow reports:

“This is a very important day for Afghanistan’s democratic institutions,” said Peter D. Lepsch, a senior legal adviser for Democracy International in Kabul. “The legislative branch has used its constitutional authority to stem presidential power. That’s a big deal.”
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The most contentious proposed change in the elections law would allow Karzai to appoint three of five members of the Electoral Complaints Commission…
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This appointment proposal was a driving force for many lawmakers to vote against it by waving red cards in the air, according to Mirwais Yasini, the deputy speaker of the lower house.

“We had a very bad experience in the presidential election; it cannot be considered legal. The credibility of the current president is under question. Looking ahead, we have to have good transparency. We had to reject this law,” he said.

The members present in the lower house — about half the total — overwhelmingly voted against the proposal.

–Jonathan Partow, “Afghan parliament’s lower house rejects Karzai election proposals,” The Washington Post, April 1, 2010.

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