If you’re the kind of person who wants to love Foreign Policy but can’t get past the popups…or the content…or the editorial direction it’s taken…this post is for you. If you worry more about Mynamar than Miley, then you’re my target audience, reader. But if you think connecting pop culture to foreign affairs is a bad idea and only slight less childish than an episode of Basketball Wives, then stop reading now. Because it’s time for a long-overdue pop culture binge to explain what’s going on with the Afghan elections. Which, of course, means GIFs. And music.
Afghan Elections: In GIFs
For months, the Afghan elections have been pretty much all drama.
Which is cool if the only thing at stake are the fragile egos of budding narcissistic fashionistas. Unfortunately, given the potential ethnic tensions tied to this election, if things go poorly, it’ll look less like “Project Runway” and more like a bad 300 outtake.
The first round went off fairly well, despite Taliban attempts at violence.
Things were good.
Unfortunately, no candidate received a majority of the votes.
That meant there was going to be a runoff.
Actually for most observers, that result was pretty much expected.
But while it wasn’t a surprise, an outcome was less clear.
So they held a runoff.
Ghani pulled ahead. By a lot.
And he was pulling ahead in mostly Pashtun areas.
Which made Abdullah and his not-so-Pashtun backers…happy.
And then came the voter fraud allegations.
Abdullah took exception with the process and the IEC.*
But this week, Abdullah’s camp, still unhappy, toned it down.
Now the election’s been called for Ghani.
Which, if you’re Ghani is super great news.
If you’re Abdullah, you’re probably taking it less well.
But hopefully tomorrow goes like this…
…and not this.
Election Announcement Playlist
If you’d rather explain your electoral processes in song…
Abdullah was all like…
…and then the IEC was all like…
But as far as Abdullah was concerned, the whole process was flawed.
And now that’s it called for Ghani, violence is a real possibility.
Hopefully Ghani reaches out.
Otherwise this could be a rough couple of months.
Until the next time, you stay on that sunny side, kids!
*Independent Election Commission