The Independent Election Commission (IEC) has retreated from its demand for a new registration of voters countrywide in the lead up to the 2014 presidential election, saying Wednesday that the old registration cards will be used instead.
New cards will only be issued to those citizens who were not registered in the last election, officials said.
"Based on our new plan, the people with the previous cards can vote – their cards are valid. And we will give new cards to those whom do not have card," IEC Secretariat chief Zia-ul-Haq Amarkhel said at a press conference in Kabul.
The shift comes after months of IEC insistence that new registrations for all voting citizens were necessary to reduce fraud in the 2014 election. Its two previous drafts on the matter were rejected by the government.
President Hamid Karzai spoke out against the IEC plan on his return from the US this month, saying that there was no budget to re-register all voters and issue new cards.
Amarkhel said the commission will give the list of 7000 polling stations to security organisations in one month. The organisations will have three months to secure the stations and then registrations of newly-qualified voters will begin.
Registration voters will start end of April 2013 and will continue until two weeks before the election on 5 April 2014.
"The commission aims to share the list of polling stations with security organisations in one month," Amarkhel said.
Amarkhel rejected rumours that the IEC chief Fazil Ahmad Manawi does not support the new draft, saying that the international community, government and other organisations have agreed with the draft.