The two presidential candidates met with President Hamid Karzai Monday night to discuss the new terms of their power-sharing arrangement that have been negotiated over the past couple of weeks.
According to a press release from the Presidential Palace, the meeting between the candidates and Karzai went well, and both men were said to have reaffirmed their commitments to resolving their differences and reaching an agreement soon. The press release said Karzai' vice-presidents were also in attendance.
Before the sit-down at the Palace, however, the Abdullah Abdullah campaign asserted that a key dispute over whether or not the Chief Executive position would be in charge of the Council of Ministers had been put to rest. The Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai campaign has reported something different.
Both teams have confirmed that the candidates have discussed a new plan for the national unity government they agreed to form back in August following meetings with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry. According to Abdullah's camp, the two campaigns have agreed that the Chief Executive will serve as the Chairman of the Council of Ministers.
"An agreement has been made on one of the disputed points regarding whether the Chief Executive will also serve as Chairman of Council of Ministers," Abdullah spokesman Syed Aqa Fazel Sancharaki said Monday.
Meanwhile, the Ghani campaign has maintained that the elected president will serve as head of government and Chairman of the Council of Ministers. "The presidential order will certify the job descriptions of the Chief Executive and his vices and the elected president will be head of the government and Chairman of Council of Ministers," Ghani spokesman Faizullah Zaki said on Monday.
Although the two sides have been in contention over the issue of the Chief Executive for weeks, it remains unclear why, now, after negotiations reached an impasse that they would report such different stories about the outcome of their talks.
Both campaigns confirmed that they remain at odds over the final results of the election and the manner in which either camp will participate in the formation of the national unity government.
In addition to Karzai's expected meeting on Monday, the United Nations, the U.S. and other allies have played a huge role in mediating the negotiations and trying to move them forward.
"We are studying the new plan submitted by our U.S. friends, both candidates are meeting at the moment and candidates will have a meeting with President Karzai this evening," Zaki said.
According to Sancharaki, Abdullah has taken a stance against the Independent Election Commission (IEC) announcing the election results. IEC officials last week said that they would release the results in a week's time regardless of where the candidates' negotiations stand.
Many Afghans have grown tired of the election process, and have said the uncertainty surrounding it has caused businesses to take a hit.
Mohammad Zahir is a street seller and has felt the hurt of the tumultuous election process in his day-to-day life. "We do not have good business these days, our economy is declining, we ask the candidates to reach an agreement soon, because people are tired," he told TOLOnews.
The election process has now dragged on for six months.
