|
|
|
|
|
|
Shiites Win Big in Iraqi Elections
 |
|
Shiite leader Abdul Aziz al-Hakim weeps after hearing the results of national elections in Baghdad as he expected a landslide victory. (Reuters)
|
BAGHDAD,
February 13 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – Iraq's main
Shiite list swept to a resounding victory in the Iraqi general
elections, the first in half a century, winning almost half seats of
the interim parliament.
The
United Iraqi Alliance (UIA), a Shiite coalition blessed by Iraq's most
revered Shiite scholar, Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani, won 132 seats
of the 275-member Transitional National Assembly, reported Agence
France Presse (AFP) quoting the independent election commission.
It
got 4,075,295 of the 8,456,266 votes, around 48.1 percent, according
to the final results announced by the commission.
The
Kurdish ticket, grouping the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and
the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), came second with 71 seats.
The
Kurds got 2,175,551 ballots or 25.7 percent of the vote.
Interim
Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi's list ranked third with 13.8 percent
and 38 seats while Iraqi President Ghazi al-Yawer's gathered only 1.7
percent of the vote .
A
list headed by Adnan Pachachi, a one-time presidential candidate and a
former foreign minister, took only 12,000 votes, making up 0.1 percent
of the vote.
On
January 30, up to 8 million Iraqis, some ululating with joy, others
hiding their faces in fear, cast ballots across the war-torn country.
Prestigious
Posts
 |
|
Abdel
Mahdi is one of the Shiites’ possible candidates for the prime
minister post. (Reuters)
|
The
interim parliament will elect a president and his two deputies, who in
turn will have to unanimously pick a prime minister.
The
new premier will then be tasked with choosing a cabinet that has to be
approved by a majority in parliament.
The
UIA insists on capturing the much-coveted and influential prime
minister post.
Its
three main candidates are interim Deputy President Ibrahim Jaafari,
interim Finance Minister Adel Abdel Mahdi and Ahmad Chalabi, a
one-time Pentagon’s protégé.
The
Kurds, for their part, want their candidate, PUK leader Jalal
Talabani, to be president or prime minister.
According
to the interim constitution, the Assembly has to write a permanent one
by August 15, but the parliament speaker and a majority of the chamber
can decide on a non-renewable six-month extension, AFP said .
If
the initial deadline is met, the country's new basic law will be put
to vote in a referendum on October 15, before polls for a new
constitutionally-elected government are held on December 15 .
First
Step
Pachachi
told Al-Arabiya television on Sunday that it was clear “a big number
of Iraqis” did not participate in the election, and “there are
some who are not correctly and adequately represented in the National
Assembly”.
He
recognized the polls as “correct” and “a first step”.
“We
should concentrate our attention on drafting the constitution which
should be written by all Iraqi factions in preparation for wider
elections,” Pachachi said.
The
majority of Sunnis die not cast ballot in the polls for being held
under the US occupation.
The
Association of Muslim Scholars, the highest Sunni religious authority
in Iraq, championed the call for election boycott.
The
Islamic Party of Iraq, the main Sunni political party, had quit the
election race also over aggravating insecurity.
However,
efforts are under way to convince all Iraqis, mainly the Sunnis, to
participate in forming the coming Iraqi government.
“Intensive
talks are being held with all Iraqi sides that have participated and
boycotted the elections in order to reach a specific vision of the
formation of the new Iraqi government,” Jawad Taqi, the official in
charge of political relations in the Supreme Council of Islamic
Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), told Aljazeera earlier on Sunday.
The
Bush administration reportedly proposed to grant Iraq's Sunnis a
number of portfolios and high-profile posts in the future government.
It
also raised with Iraqi officials the possibility of adding some of the
top Sunni vote-getters in the general elections to the interim
legislature even if they lose to non-Sunni candidates, reported The
New York Times on Sunday, December 26.
But
the proposals were rejected
by representatives of Sunni and Shiite powers.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
