The vote is a test for the country’s burgeoning democracy as foreign troops prepare to pull out.

Some 12 million Afghans go to the polls tomorrow, April 5, 2014 in general elections that will also see the first round attempt to select a replacement for outgoing President Hamid Karzai. A total of eight candidates are running for President.

Agency reports say the election, the third presidential poll since the fall of the Taliban in 2001, is expected to pave the way for the country's first-ever peaceful democratic transfer of power as the Constitution bars President Karzai from standing again. Observers say if the process goes into the second round as expected, it would take at least six weeks to organise the runoff. Though President Hamid Karzai is officially due to step down next month, the country might only get a new leader in July or August at the earliest.

Those running are Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, Daoud Sultanzoy, Qutbuddin Helal, Gul Agha Sherzai, Abdul Rab Rassoul Sayyaf, Zalmai Rassoul, Abdullah Abdullah and Hedayat Amin Arsala. Recent opinion polls showed Ahmadzai and Rassoul as leading. All the eight candidates are from the majority Pashtun ethnic group that has provided all but one of the country’s leaders in the last 100 years. The Pashtun are also the group from which the Taliban originally hailed. Most of the people live in the southern and eastern parts of the country where the insurgency is strong and election violence is expected to be high.

The challenges facing the new leader include poverty and the Taliban insurgency. With most foreign forces due to withdraw from the country by the end of the year, the next leader will certainly have a tall order containing the restive militants who have not only vowed to disrupt the vote, but already started doing so by attacking election officials and offices.

Similarly, the weak economy fuels the insurgency as some of the young people who cannot find jobs turn to the Taliban, fighting for salaries similar to those offered by the National Police and army. Apart from deciding if he will keep American forces on Afghan soil in return for cash and military support, the new President has to negotiate difficult relations with neighbouring Iran and Pakistan that host large populations of Afghan refugees.