State media coverage of the Afghanistan elections overwhelmingly favors President Hamid Karzai, Afghanistan’s electoral committee has said.
The Independent Election Committee announced Sunday that President Hamid Karzai, who is running for reelection in August, receives well over half of the state media’s coverage of the elections.
“In print government media, 72 percent is allocated to President Karzai, 12 percent to Dr. Abdullah and five percent to Dr. Asharf Ghani Ahmadzai,” Sadiqullah Tawhidi, the electoral committee’s media monitoring chief said in a press conference Sunday.
An Independent Election Committee report, also released Sunday, noted that both independent and government-run TV stations engaged in significant bias. “National TV allocated most of the time to President Karzai and Noor TV to Dr. Abdullah,” the report read.
National TV is a government-run television station, and Noor TV is privately owned.
“Karzai is largely covered by the state media more than any other candidates,” Noorrahman Rahmani, program manager of the Institute for War and Peace Reporting in Afghanistan, told The Media Line.
“Every single warlord and party involved in the Afghan civil wars have their own TV station and other print media,” Rahmani said. “They are also biased and they support whomever has promised them more government seats and other privileges.”
41 candidates are running for president in the August 20 elections: President Karzai is the incumbent, and former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah is considered the frontrunner among his opponents. Former finance minister Ashraf Ghani is also seen as a serious contender.
“Abdullah Abdullah is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars a week on his media coverage,” Rahmani said. “This money goes to the non-government TV stations who apparently do not support any candidates. But there are many other private TV stations who are linked to his political party and cover his every step.”
“There are many non-government affiliated TV stations or other media outlets that support specific candidates,” he added. “They are pro- some specific candidate or candidates and against others.”
Rahmani argued that dispite the bias in media coverage, it was unlikely to sway voters.
“People will care more about is the achievements and the programs the candidates have,” he said. “People know what [President] Karzai did over the past seven or eight years and such coverage will not have an effect on them.”