Election campaign posters, Baghdad (AP)
Early voting began today in Iraq ahead of the national parliamentary elections which will take place on Sunday, March 7. Some 6,200 candidates are running for office including members of the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, other political parties and tribal confederations and unknown first-timers.
Despite heightened security, violence in Iraq continues with three coordinated suicide attacks yesterday in the city of Baquba and two suicide bombings at polling stations in Baghdad today.
While gearing up for elections, the Iraqi government has also been attempting to improve relations with its neighbors. On a visit to Syria on Tuesday, Iraqi Vice President Tariq Al-Hashemi called for normalizing relations between the two countries months after Baghdad accused Damascus of harboring terrorism suspects. On Tuesday, Iraq appointed its first ambassador to Kuwait since Saddam Hussein invaded the country in 1990.
Below are some pieces previewing the elections and the challenges ahead in Iraq
Iraq’s Elections Highlight Gap in U.S. Policy
by Brian Katulis, senior fellow, Center for American Progress (Arab Reform Bulletin)
Iraq’s March 7 parliamentary elections represent the ultimate “stress test” for the country’s fragile democratic transition. …
Regardless of the outcome, a new government in Iraq will represent an opportunity for the Obama administration to link its Iraq policy to a more coherent strategic approach to the broader Middle East. … If, as some analysts argue, the recent political developments inside of Iraq point to the country moving closer to Iran’s orbit, what does that mean for broader U.S. policy objectives? Iraq featured prominently in the past two administration’s broader regional strategies: Iraq was at the center of the Bush administration’s Freedom Agenda, and was one half of a dual containment policy that included Iran under the Clinton administration. Whether those approaches were the best for advancing U.S. interests is debatable, but there was an overall strategy.
The Obama administration should more clearly define how it sees the bilateral relationship with Iraq fitting into a larger plan to deescalate tensions and foster stability in the broader Gulf region. A new Iraq is emerging, and the elections will produce a different government, but the Obama administration has not yet figured out a coherent regional strategy in which Iraq once again plays an important role. Access the full article>>
Maliki’s Hold on Power Uncertain
by Liz Sly (Los Angeles Times)
Since taking office in 2006, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has defied expectations, proving to be a canny and often bold leader who has transformed himself from a virtual unknown into possibly the single most popular politician in Iraq. Yet in the process, he has alienated most of Iraq’s other political leaders, to the extent that he is going to have a tough time holding on to his job after Sunday’s elections, in which Iraqis will vote for a new parliament that will in turn choose a new government.
It is a crucial election. Whatever government emerges from the polls will determine Iraq’s future beyond the scheduled final departure of U.S. troops in 2011—and should the election not go well, there is a chance the U.S. military would seek to delay the withdrawal of combat troops due to take place by August. It is also an election whose result is almost impossible to predict, with the eventual outcome likely to be decided not so much by voters as by the alliances that are struck after the ballots are counted. Access the full article>>
Iraq’s Uncertain Future: Elections and Beyond
by International Crisis Group, Middle East Report N°94
As a rule, Iraq’s post-Saddam elections have tended to magnify pre-existing negative trends. The parliamentary polls to be held on 7 March are no exception. The focus on electoral politics is good, no doubt, but the run-up has highlighted deep-seated problems that threaten the fragile recovery: recurring election-related violence; ethnic tensions over Kirkuk; the re-emergence of sectarianism; and blatant political manipulation of state institutions. The most egregious development was the decision to disqualify over 500 candidates, a dangerous, arbitrary step lacking due process, yet endorsed by the Shiite ruling parties. Under normal circumstances, that alone might have sufficed to discredit the elections. But these are not normal circumstances, and for the sake of Iraq’s stability, the elections must go on. At a minimum, however, the international community should ramp up its electoral monitoring and define clear red lines that need to be respected if the results are to be considered legitimate. And it should press the next government to seriously tackle the issue—long-neglected yet never more critical—of national reconciliation. …
Serious work toward national reconciliation is long overdue. This time, forming a coalition government and holding it up as an example of national unity will not suffice. There will have to be meaningful progress on opening up political space, increasing cross-sectarian participation and improving transparency and accountability. Reform of de-Baathification should be a priority, at least to set clear criteria and procedures embedded in law; the process should also be given a time horizon of a maximum of two years, at which point all remaining files should be closed and the effort terminated. In this endeavor, it will remain critical for members of the international community to stay actively engaged and bolster a still-weak Iraqi state by offering their Iraqi partners full technical, financial and diplomatic assistance and support economic reconstruction. U.S. troops may be on their way out, but it is too soon to abandon Iraq to the vagaries of internal conflicts and regional rivalries. Access the full article>>
Ethnic Groups Seek to Use Ballot to Tighten Grip on Oil-Rich Kirkuk
by The Associated Press
Young men hurtle down dusty streets in cars, waving flags and blaring campaign slogans in a fervor that highlights this city’s dangerous ethnic divisions. Arabs, Turkomen and Kurds each see Iraq’s parliamentary elections as a chance to prove one thing: Kirkuk is ours. The claims over this oil-rich city are so contentious that they forced a delay in the national elections for two months as politicians debated how to apportion its votes.
The balloting, now scheduled for Sunday, will be the first of any kind in the city for five years—and a measure of which group has the political clout to reinforce its claim. The results could have far-reaching implications not only for this city but for the whole of Iraq. Access the full article>>
Iraq’s Top Cleric Refuses to Influence Elections
by Steven Lee Myers (The New York Times)
No one man in Iraq has more power to change the outcome of the country’s elections on Sunday than a frail cleric who lives in an ascetic house in this holy city. And yet he has refused to wield it, shaping the relationship between Islam and the state at a crucial juncture in Iraq’s history. The cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq’s senior Shiite spiritual leader, has repeatedly refused to endorse any of the electoral coalitions fighting for votes among the country’s Shiite majority. …
For a figure whose electoral blessing would be decisive, it reflects a reversal from the role he played in orchestrating a unified Shiite coalition during Iraq’s first national elections in 2005. … Several of his public positions—including his refusal to insist on a purely Shiite alliance last summer, as many wanted, and his call for direct election of candidates, instead of secretive party lists—may result in a far more competitive election. Access the full article>>
Court Case will Shape Iraq’s Oil Policy—And Its Politics
by Thomas W. Donovan, attorney, Iraq Law Alliance (The National)
Anyone who wonders if the rule of law can ever take hold in Iraq should pay attention to the case of al-Mosawi vs Nuri al-Maliki, now being heard in Baghdad Federal Court. The question to be decided is this: which entity in the Iraqi political spectrum—the prime minister, the oil minister, the 275-member parliament, the local governorates, or the Kurdish Regional Government—has the legal authority to contract with international oil companies to develop the nation’s vast oil wealth. …
Whichever way the court decides, the process itself is heartening for those who hope the nation can develop its democratic legal institutions. … A trained and competent judiciary has demonstrated a strict separation of powers from the immense political and economic pressures forced upon it. … The proceedings are public, open and transparent. In such a country, where sectarian violence between ethnic groups, tribes and political parties still dominates the headlines, it is rare that grievances are handled professionally and through proper channels. …
The obvious accomplishment is that, for the first time in the recent political history of the Middle East, a female parliamentarian has stood and openly challenged a political policy with real and tangible consequences. Access the full article>>
