Afghan Businesses: Election Season Caused Economic Hardship --- The Afghan presidential election has been a financial disappointment. Businesses say revenue is down, and even companies you'd think would make money off a campaign, say they're in the red. -- Afghanistan is a little closer to having a new president. The country has launched an audit of every VOTE cast in last month's runoff election to ensure the outcome is free fraud. Now, in many countries election season means big money for pollsters and media consultants and restaurants and local TV stations. But as the fight for power in Afghanistan continues, businesses across Kabul have faced hardship. NPR's Sean Carberry reports. -- SEAN CARBERRY, BYLINE: Abdullah Abdullah's one of the two candidates waiting for the results. He lives in the middle of a busy Kabul neighborhood with everything from furniture stores to fruit stands nearby. There's always been a checkpoint just outside his house, but since the campaign, additional metal gates and concrete blast walls have sprung up. Ahmad Fuad has an ice cream store close to Abdullah's house. Even though officials and tribal elders have been flocking, it's not helping local vendors like Fuad. -- CARBERRY: The 30-year-old says both directions to his shop have been cut off from regular traffic. -- FUAD: (Through translator) When guests arrive, they park their vehicles here in front of my shop and block the view. The bodyguards come in, sit in the shop and leave without paying anything. --- CARBERRY: But economic hardship has hardly been confined to Abdullah's neighbors. The uncertainty over whether the election will be settled peacefully has put spending on hold. Many construction sites have gone silent and shopkeepers here outside Kabul airport say they too are hurting. - More, Sean Carberry, NPR, http://www.npr.org/2014/07/18/332498762/afghan-businesses-election-season-caused-economic-hardship