KABUL - President Ashraf Ghani has ordered his Second Vice President, Mohammad Sarwar Danish, to review proposals for reform in the national electoral system along with members of the Independent Election Commission (IEC) and civil society groups.

The announcement comes as the momentum of calls for electoral reform before the next parliamentary elections has picked up in the National Assembly and among the public. According to a Presidential Palace press release on Thursday, Ghani has met with civil society activists, political parties and members of the electoral commissions, and is committed to bringing about reform.

However, while Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah has been a major proponent of reform, sources close to him have raised issue with the move by the Presidential Palace. According to Mahmood Saiqal, a close advisor to Abdullah, pursuing reform without forming a special, independent commission is in violation of the agreement Ghani and Abdullah made that in part allowed them to come together under the national unity government framework.

"Reform in the electoral commissions was among the agreements of the national unity government's creation," Saiqal told TOLOnews on Thursday. "The current move and whatever will be created as a result of it will be seriously questioned by the international community and the people."

Meanwhile, a number of election watchdog groups have maintained that, since the commission was involved in fraud itself, it should not be involved in the decision-making process when it comes to enacting reform. Though, all together, civil society groups have emphasized that the most important thing is real reforms are pursued quickly and before the next election cycle.

"Our request is that the reforms are brought as soon as possible and that the reforms are not political," said Muhammad Naeem Ayoubzada, the head of the Transparent Election Foundation of Afghanistan.

"Reforms in the election system is a need that must not be forgotten," said Aziz Rafiee, the Chairman of Civil Society Association.

The civil society activists are not alone, however. In addition to a number of major donors to Afghanistan, like the European Union, calling for immediate electoral reform, Afghan political parties and leaders have also coalesced around the issue.

Ahmad Zaki, a leader of the Social Justice Movement, has said that if reforms are not made before the parliamentary elections, the result of the votes would be a national unity-styled legislature. "In this situation, we might have three people sitting in one chair," he said. (Tolonews)