(Bloomberg) -- Afghans are set to vote in long-delayed parliamentary elections on Saturday after a recent spate of high-profile Taliban attacks and intimidation.

After a three-year postponement due to widespread violence across the country, Taliban territorial gains and technical problems at Afghanistan’s election agency, voters will have to defy widespread threats to choose their lawmakers.

The elections come just two days after the influential police chief of Kandahar province, Abdul Raziq, was killed by a security guard. Kandahar’s intelligence chief was also gunned down after a meeting in which General Austin Scott Miller, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, was also present. Miller emerged unscathed, but Kandahar’s Governor Zalmay Weesa and two American soldiers were wounded in the shooting claimed by the Taliban.

The assault is a dire sign of the insecurity across Afghanistan as its population heads to the ballot. The Taliban has vowed to block the election and following Thursday’s attack President Ashraf Ghani decided to delay the vote in Kandahar by a week. Since 2001, when the Taliban were ousted in the U.S. invasion, elections in Afghanistan have been repeatedly tainted by violence, widespread ballot-stuffing and delays. A discredited process could prompt a fresh crisis in Afghanistan.

‘Test Run’

Afghan Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah, who shares power with Ghani, told an audience in New York last month that pulling off the parliamentary vote will be “challenging.” The poll is a “test run for the more consequential presidential elections” in April 2019, said Waheed Mujhda, a Kabul-based political analyst. If these elections are impacted by fraud and violence it will “complicate and may delay” the presidential vote, he said.

The delayed vote comes as the U.S. pursues negotiations with the Taliban’s leadership through the group’s political office in Doha. This month Taliban leaders met with a U.S. delegation headed by the country’s special envoy on Afghanistan reconciliation, Zalmay Khalilzad, to discuss the prospect of ending the U.S.’s longest war through peace talks.

Around 8.8 million people -- of which 32 percent are women -- are registered to vote. Elections won’t take place in the volatile province of Ghazni until next year. The Taliban had briefly taken over the provincial capital in August.

‘Real Change’

“Our country is facing lots of problem -- no jobs, Taliban violence which has ruined Afghanistan and many others,” said Jawid Nesari, a 25-year-old Kabul University student. “We’re still hopeful for a real change through our vote.”

More than 2,500 candidates, including 400 women, are competing for 249 seats in the lower house of parliament. The candidates range from conservative politicians, businessmen and young aspirants. About ten candidates have been killed in the past two weeks while campaigning.

Afghanistan’s Interior Ministry said at least 54,000 Afghan security personnel will be deployed to protect 5,100 polling stations across the country. One-third of the polling stations, mostly in the remote areas, will remain shut due to increasing Taliban threats, according to the United Nations. The results are expected to be announced on Nov. 10.

To contact the reporter on this story: Eltaf Najafizada in Kabul at enajafizada1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Arijit Ghosh at aghosh@bloomberg.net, Chris Kay

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