Noor Mohammad Noor, the Spokesman of the Independent Election Commission (IEC), on Sunday confirmed that 2327 candidates, including 240 women, have filed their nominations for the Provincial Council elections set for next spring.
The nomination filing process for the Provincial Council elections ended at 4:00pm on Sunday, while the registration process for Presidential candidates was extended due to a number of last-minute filings.
IEC officials noted that no female candidates had filed from the Jowzjan, Faryab and Nuristan provinces until Saturday. But, on the last day of the process, female candidates from those provinces came forward, making it so that every one of the country's 34 provinces has at least one female candidate vying for a provincial council seat.
Given recent concerns expressed by Afghan women's advocates and the international community regarding the lack of female involvement in the elections, IEC officials were happy to see the number of female candidates that filed. The provinces where that had the highest number of females register were Kabul, Bamyan, Herat, Balkh, Ghazni and Takhar.
With security as one of the main causes cited for discouraging female voter turnout and candidacy, it was no surprise that some of the country's most restive provinces had the lowest number of female nominations. These included, Maidan Wardak, Paktika, Badghis, Samangan, Daikondi and Badakhshan.
According to the Election Law, out of the 420 members of Provincial Councils, 20 percent of the seats are reserved for women.