The Change and Hope Coalition, the opposition group led by Dr. Abdullah Abdullah, had predicted that it would garner at least 100 seats in the new Parliament. But the preliminary results showed very few seats allocated to representatives of the Coalition.

Dr. Abdullah was the main challenger to Hamid Karzai in last year’s presidential elections. After the fraud-plagued poll and a scheduled runoff that was cancelled when Abdullah withdrew, Karzai was declared the winner, and his rival set up an opposition group critical of the central government.

“People voted for opposition candidates because they are tired of the current government,” said Mohammad Naim, a member of the campaign team for Saleh Mohammad Registani, a Change and Hope candidate who was unsuccessful in gaining a seat in Parliament. “But President Karzai tried to include his favored candidates in the winners’ list when he learned that many Change and Hope candidates were successful.”

According to Naim, Karzai cancelled his planned visit to the United Nations General Assembly, held in New York in late September, because he wanted to oversee the results of the elections.

“President Karzai asked the Independent Election Commission (IEC) to include the names of 16 candidates loyal to him in the list of winners in Kabul,” said Naim.

Presidential spokesperson Siamak Herawi rejected any allegations of interference by the Presidential palace in the IEC’s activities.

“There are many winning candidates who have been critical of the government,” he said. “President Karzai cancelled his trip to the UN General Assembly because of the importance of the election process, as well as due to some security issues. He preferred to stay home and maintain direct contact with the security bodies to provide better implementation of the process.”

Some Change and Hope candidates were more philosophical about their losses.

“I do not think that a huge number of opposition MPs will come to the Parliament,” said Mohammad Sarwar Jawadi, a member of the Change and Hope Coalition who lost his seat in Bamian province. “All parties standing for elections expect to receive a lot of seats, but it might be just misplaced optimism. Given the current situation in Afghanistan, individuals change their political stance with the seasons, so if the Change and Hope Coalition announces the names of their winning candidates, some of those candidates may deny their affiliation with the Coalition.”

Khaled Pashtoon, an MP from Kandahar, who lost his seat in the September 18 elections, has a different view.

“On the one hand, I think that there are various allegations of fraud over the results of the elections,” he said. “But on the other hand, once the preliminary results were announced I was happy that people in the more volatile areas of the country could learn the value of their votes.”

According to Pashtoon’s estimates, there will be 90 MPs from the Pashtun ethnic group in the new Parliament, as opposed to 124 in the old one. The number of MPs from the Hazara ethnic group increased from 37 to 70.

But focusing on ethnic issues could lead to problems, say some MPs.

“The situation is so sensitive in Afghanistan,” said Shinkai Karokhel, a winning candidate from Kabul. “It will not be good for the country if representatives think only about benefiting their own groups. It is better if everyone works together to establish a strong Parliament to monitor the government’s activities.”

Partaw Nadiri, whose bid for a seat from Badakhshan province was unsuccessful, believes that talk of an opposition group is just that – talk.

“There is no real opposition in Afghanistan,” he said. “The Change and Hope Coalition is just a name. It is not a political opposition.”

But there are some who see real progress in the opposition’s stance.

“The Change and Hope Coalition’s position will be stronger in the new Parliament,” said Ahmad Behzad, a Coalition member and, according to the preliminary results, a successful candidate for Parliament. However, he decline to provide details about exact numbers of opposition MPs to be seated in the new legislature.

Analysts are focusing on the Parliamentary system itself, rather than on the individual candidates who will make up the legislature. The new body will face the same problems as the previous one, they say, unless and until a political party structure gains some strength.

“The absence of powerful political parties and their representatives in the parliament is a big problem in Afghanistan,” said Wahid Mojda, a Kabul-based political analyst. “Instead of political parties, it is individuals who make the decisions.”