Iraq Votes – Part XI

By MEMRI Staff

Left: Ayad Allawi: right: Nouri Al-Maliki

After many delays, and amidst a growing controversy about the integrity of the vote counting, the Iraqi Independent Elections Commission chose Friday night, March 26 to announce the results of the general elections which took place on March 8. The results are the following:

Slate Number of Seats

Al-Iraqiya (Ayad Allawi) 91

Dawlat al-Qanon (Nouri al-Maliki) 89

National Alliance (Ammar al-Hakim) 70

Kurdish Alliance 43

Coalition of Iraqi Unity 4

Tawafuq (Sunni group) 6

Change (Goran-Kurdish) 8

Ittihad Islami (Kurdish) 4

Jama'ah Islamiya (Kurdish) 2

Minorities (5 Christians and 3 other Minorities) 8

TOTAL 325

Comments and Observations on the Elections Results

First, no slate has gained an absolute majority. Hence, a coalition government of multiple parties is inevitable.

Second, the results of the elections have not gone uncontested, and Prime Minister Al-Maliki was the first to contest them in an address to the Iraqi people, minutes after the results were announced.

Al-Maliki insists that the elections results were tinged with fraud, particularly in Baghdad province He claims that fraud has caused his group the loss of 11 seats, and therefore the vote should be recounted manually, one vote at a time.[1]

A spokesman for Al-Maliki said the Elections Commission must recount the vote or "history will condemn it."[2] Expressing his frustration and disappointment with the results, al-Maliki told Al-Sumaria satellite TV that "a volcano is exploding in the hearts of the people."[3] One would hope that volcanoes would not explode in the hearts of Iraqi cities.

Third, not a single secular slate gained one seat. Left out of the next parliament are Mithal Alousi, Ayad Jamal Al-Din and the Communist Party; all of them share a belief in secular Iraq and condemn Iranian interference in Iraq affairs.

The elections law passed by parliament on the eve of the elections favored the large slates, which received all seven compensatory seats, to the detriment of the smaller parties.

Fourth, not a single Shi'a candidate won a seat in the predominantly Sunni areas, and not a single Sunni was elected in a predominately Shi'a province. Likewise, no Arab won a seat in the three Kurdish provinces. Sectarianism remains a fact of life in the current Iraqi political culture.

Fifth, the Kurdish vote in the three Kurdish provinces was split between the Kurdish Alliance which comprised the two traditional Kurdish parties, the Kurdistan Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, and the reformist group Change (Goran) which gained sex seats in the province of Suleimaniyah, the stronghold of President Jalal Talabani and two seats in the province of Erbil, the stronghold of the Kurdish leader, Mas'oud Barazani. Kurdish Islamic groups earned another six seats. While Talabani may still earn a second term as president of Iraq his power base in Iraqi Kurdistan has been eroded.

Sixth, there are three principal political offices which have to be filled in a descending order of priority: the speaker of parliament to preside over the election of the president of the republic who in turn will designate a member of parliament to form a new government. Of the three positions, that of the president must receive two-thirds of the 325 members of parliament, or 217 votes. This will require the support of at least three of the four leading slates listed above.

Seventh, the president designates a prime minister from among the largest group in parliament to form a new government and seek a parliamentary vote of confidence. That designation would have gone automatically to Ayad Allawi whose slate won the largest number of seats. However, the Constitutional Court has ruled that the president should select a candidate from the largest body or coalition of members. Therefore, if the second and third slates listed about were to unify, as seems possible under Iran's sponsorship of political meetings in Tehran, then the president will be required to choose a candidate from the group with the largest combined number of seats rather than from the individual slate with the largest number of seats (i.e., Allawi's.)[4]

Eighth, with the ink on the elections results hardly dry, two key leaders, President Jalal Talabani and Vice President Adel Abd Al-Mahdi were in Tehran ostensibly to participate in the Nawruz festivities [a Kurdish holiday.] Two delegations representing the Iraqi National Alliance and Al-Maliki's Dawlat Al-Qanon travelled to Iran the following day.[5] Another Iraqi leader, Muqtada Al-Sadr, whose faction controls 38-40 of the 70 seats gained by the Iraqi National Alliance, is already in Iran to pursue religious studies, and he is also involved in the discussions. Many reports from Tehran suggest that the primarily Shi'a parties and the Kurds are negotiating a coalition under Iran's auspices.[6] Iran, which was suspected of interfering in the elections to exclude from parliament anti-Iranian voices such as those of Alousi and Jamal Al-Din (see fifth paragraph above), appears to be determined to prevent the formation of a new government by Ayad Allawi, who is supported by Iraqi Sunnis and, by extension, by the Saudi regime.

Ninth, the Kurds who profess to like Allawi are reluctant to offer him their support because one of the elements in his coalition is a group of Sunni nationalists, under Usama Al-Nujaifi, from the city of Mosul in northern Iraq, who are accused by the Kurds of advocating Arab chauvinism. The United States is sponsoring a meeting between Al-Nujaifi and Kurdish leaders in Istanbul, Turkey, today in an effort to find a solution for the conflict.[7]

Tenth, the winning coalition will have to agree on the allocation of the three most significant political offices in the country, known as sovereign posts. Sectarian considerations will play a critical role. It is given that the prime minister will be a Shi'a. The contentious issue would be whether the president of Iraq should be an Arab, which could oblige the Kurds to surrender the office of the president, currently occupied by Talabani, and accept that of the speakership of parliament as a lesser alternative. Despite many statements to the contrary, sectarianism rather than Iraqi nationalism will have the upper hand.

Eleventh, while fraud and improper vote counting may have taken place, it is a fact stressed by an Iraqi commentator that for the first time in the history of Arab countries, it is the government in power rather than the opposition which is questioning the results of elections.[8] It would suggest that if there were fraud it could not have been carried out on a large scale, otherwise Al-Maliki would have won a big majority hands down. After all, it was Al-Maliki's government that appointed the members of the Elections Commission – the same Commission that certified the big win of Al-Maliki's Dawlat Al-Qanon in the provincial elections in January 2009.

Twelfth, with the elections behind them, the Iraqi political forces will start the negotiations and the bargaining for forming a new government, a process that is likely to be long and contentious – not to mention the risk of the eruption of political and sectarian violence. It is not outside the realm of the possible that neither Al-Maliki nor Allawi will be Iraq's next prime minister.

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