Supporters of disqualified parliamentary poll winners protested against the Electoral Complaints Commission decision on Tuesday.

The credibility of the eventual result will weigh heavily when US President Barack Obama reviews his Afghan war strategy next month amid rising violence and sagging public support, especially after a fraud-marred presidential election last year.

Consistent allegations of vote fraud in both polls has raised questions about the credibility of Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s government at a time when US and NATO officials have been re-examining their long-term commitment in Afghanistan.

IEC spokeswoman Marzia Siddiqi Salim said on Tuesday the commission had called a media conference for Wednesday to release the results. Preliminary results were announced on Oct. 20.

A UN-backed election watchdog said on Sunday nearly one in 10 winning candidates had been disqualified for fraud.

Sunday’s disqualifications by the UN-backed Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) cleared the way for the Aghan government’s IEC to release the final results.

All 21 candidates disqualified by the ECC on Sunday had won a majority of votes in their districts. Seven of them were sitting lawmakers in the 249-seat wolesi jirga, or lower house of Parliament, and one is a first cousin of Karzai.

The lack of a result so long after the vote was a worrying sign for Afghanistan’s NATO partners, who wrapped up a major summit in Lisbon last week where an exit plan from the conflict for roughly 150,000 foreign troops was top of the agenda.

The NATO leaders endorsed Karzai’s target of 2014 for Afghan forces to take complete security responsibility, although some US and NATO officials cautioned that might spill into 2015.

Civilian and military casualties this year have been the highest since the overthrow of the Taleban in 2001, despite the presence of a record number of foreign troops.

Complaints about fraud and vote rigging have dogged the parliamentary vote, beginning even before Afghans went to the polls. Afghan officials however have hailed the vote a success.

Western observers have been more guarded in their response. Staffan De Mistura, the top UN envoy in Afghanistan, has praised Afghans for staging the poll in the middle of a violent insurgency but also noted “considerable fraud” took place.

Several hundred protesters, angry about the ECC’s decision, rallied in the northern and central provinces of Baghlan and Faryab on Monday, demanding the reinstatement of representatives who had been thrown out.

“We don’t want this corrupt government and if our candidates are not back in the winning lists, we will pick up weapons and fight the government, and the government will be responsible,” said angry protester Ahmad Nisar.

Baghlan Gov. Abdul Majeed on Tuesday put the number of protesters at about a thousand.

Karzai cautioned protesters against any violent response.

“If they have complaints and they are just, then they have to submit their complaints to the Supreme Court, but going for violence or armed conflict ... is a national treason,” Karzai told a news conference at his palace.

Scores of candidates have alleged bribe-taking or fraud by election officials and called for a new poll in recent weeks.

Some have warned that a Parliament that does not properly represent Afghanistan’s various ethnic groups risked further instability.

There were more than 6,000 complaints lodged with ECC and the IEC has already thrown out almost a quarter of the 5.6 million votes cast as invalid. The IEC itself is being investigated by the attorney general’s office over election fraud.