Monday, November 29, 2004
Iraq: New Analysis of the Elections
For anyone interested in the elections and the election controversy in Iraq, the accompanying discussion offers a wealth of useful argument and detail.
Let us review what is to happen. The election will "choose a 275-member assembly that will serve for about a year. During that time, it will select a president and two deputies, who will in turn choose one of the assembly´s members to serve as prime minister. Its main task, however, will be to draft a constitution by the middle of August 2005. This will be submitted to a referendum by next October, and then used to conduct, by 15 December 2005, elections for a fully constitutional government that is to take power by the end of next year."
Good progress has been made toward the election. Of 545 projected registration centers, all but 90 are said to be functioning. In spite of the fact of some fairly stringent qualifications, including petitions with 500 names, 126 party or individual applications to run have already been approved, although only 15 seem to represent sunni groups. The United States is trying to have one super list developed that would include most of the people in the present governing council. This would favor us and returnees. However, the Ayatollah Sistani is putting together a super Shi'a list that will probably be more attractive. In this list, 30-50% will be for shi'a religious parties, including 10-12% for al-Sadr's group, the same for SCIRI (pro-Iranian) and 20% for various Dawa groups. On the other side, an Iraqi Founding Congress has brought together all the groups intending to boycott the election.
The writers doubt that the elections can go forward with the amount of violence that there is in the country. Their hope is that the Ayatollah Sistani will see that the best solution is to wait. However, why he would do this given the advantages of not doing it are unclear. It would be a magnanimous gesture and mean a lot for the country. But this sort of approach to the problems of the country has been rare in the past and I doubt if we can have a great deal of confidence in it now, even from one with the good credentials of the Ayatollah.
Let us review what is to happen. The election will "choose a 275-member assembly that will serve for about a year. During that time, it will select a president and two deputies, who will in turn choose one of the assembly´s members to serve as prime minister. Its main task, however, will be to draft a constitution by the middle of August 2005. This will be submitted to a referendum by next October, and then used to conduct, by 15 December 2005, elections for a fully constitutional government that is to take power by the end of next year."
Good progress has been made toward the election. Of 545 projected registration centers, all but 90 are said to be functioning. In spite of the fact of some fairly stringent qualifications, including petitions with 500 names, 126 party or individual applications to run have already been approved, although only 15 seem to represent sunni groups. The United States is trying to have one super list developed that would include most of the people in the present governing council. This would favor us and returnees. However, the Ayatollah Sistani is putting together a super Shi'a list that will probably be more attractive. In this list, 30-50% will be for shi'a religious parties, including 10-12% for al-Sadr's group, the same for SCIRI (pro-Iranian) and 20% for various Dawa groups. On the other side, an Iraqi Founding Congress has brought together all the groups intending to boycott the election.
The writers doubt that the elections can go forward with the amount of violence that there is in the country. Their hope is that the Ayatollah Sistani will see that the best solution is to wait. However, why he would do this given the advantages of not doing it are unclear. It would be a magnanimous gesture and mean a lot for the country. But this sort of approach to the problems of the country has been rare in the past and I doubt if we can have a great deal of confidence in it now, even from one with the good credentials of the Ayatollah.
Comments:
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
