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Split vercict in iraq vote sets stage for weak government { February 14 2005 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://nytimes.com/2005/02/14/international/middleeast/14assess.htmlhttp://nytimes.com/2005/02/14/international/middleeast/14assess.html
February 14, 2005
NEWS ANALYSIS
Split Verdict in Iraqi Vote Sets Stage for Weak Government
By DEXTER FILKINS
BAGHDAD, Iraq, Feb. 13 - The razor-thin margin apparently captured by the Shiite alliance here in election results announced Sunday seems almost certain to enshrine a weak government that will be unable to push through sweeping changes, like granting Islam a central role in the new Iraqi state.
The verdict handed down by Iraqi voters in the Jan. 30 election appeared to be a divided one, with the Shiite political alliance, backed by the clerical leadership in Najaf, opposed in nearly equal measure by an array of mostly secular minority parties.
According to Iraqi leaders here, the fractured mandate almost certainly heralds a long round of negotiating, in which the Shiite alliance will have to strike deals with parties run by the Kurds and others, most of which are secular and broadly opposed to an enhanced role for Islam or an overbearing Shiite government.
The main responsibility of the Iraqi government over the next 10 months will be the drafting of a permanent constitution, which must pass a vote of the assembly and then be put to a vote of the people later this year. The role of Islam is widely expected to be one of the most contentious issues.
The results of the balloting appeared to leave Kurdish leaders, whose party captured more than a quarter of the assembly seats, in a particularly strong position to shape the next government. The Kurds are America's closest allies in Iraq, and most of their leaders are of a strong secular bent.
Among the demands that the Kurds and other groups will put to Shiite leaders as the price for their cooperation will be an insistence on a more secular state and concessions on Kirkuk, the ethnically divided city that Kurdish leaders want to integrate into their regional government. Kurdish leaders also say they will insist that the Iraqi president be a Kurd.
The prospect of a divided national assembly, split between religious and secular parties, also appeared to signal a continuing role for the American government, which already maintains 150,000 troops here, to help broker disputes.
As the final vote totals were being announced Sunday, Shiite leaders appeared to be scaling back their expectations, and preparing to reach out to parties in the opposition to help them form a new government.
"We have to compromise," said Adnan Ali, a senior leader in the Dawa party, one of the largest in the Shiite coalition, called the United Iraqi Alliance. "Even though we have a majority, we will need other groups to form a government."
The vote tally, which appeared to leave the Shiite alliance with about 140 of the national assembly's 275 seats, fell short of what Shiite leaders had been expecting, and seemed to blunt some of the triumphant talk that could already be heard in some corners. The final results seemed to ease fears among Iraq's Sunni, Kurd and Christian minorities that the leadership of the Shiite majority might feel free to ignore minority concerns, and possibly fall under the sway of powerful clerics, some of whom advocate the establishment of a strict Islamic state.
As a result, some Iraqi leaders predicted Sunday that the Shiite alliance would try to form a "national unity government," containing Kurdish and Sunni leaders, as well as secular Shiites, possibly including the current prime minister, Ayad Allawi. Such a leadership would all but ensure that no decisions would be taken without a broad national consensus.
One senior Iraqi official, a non-Shiite who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the slim majority won by the Shiite alliance signaled even greater obstacles for the Shiite parties in the future. If the Sunni Arabs, who largely boycotted the election, decide to take part in the future, they would almost certainly dilute the Shiite alliance's already thin margin.
"This is the height of the Shiite vote," the Iraqi official said. "The next election assumes Sunni participation, and you will see an entirely different dynamic then."
The main factor ensuring a relatively cautious Shiite majority is the complicated mechanism controlling the formation of the government. Under the rules, the prime minister will be selected by a president and two deputies, who must be approved by a two-thirds vote of the assembly. Practically speaking, that means the prime minister will have to be approved by a two-thirds vote. The Shiite alliance has nowhere near that many seats.
Iraqi leaders who are not part of the Shiite alliance say that in exchange for their support for a Shiite prime minister, they could set strict conditions on several key issues, like the role of religion in the constitution and the power of regional governments.
Under the interim constitution agreed upon last year, Islam is one of many sources of legislation, not the only source, as was advocated by some Shiite leaders.
Barham Salih, the deputy prime minister and a prominent Kurdish leader, reiterated his group's support for a limited role for Islam in the new constitution and broad powers for the Kurds to run their own affairs. He also said the Kurds would insist that Shiite leaders agree to a Kurdish president, probably Jalal Talabani, the leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, one of the main Kurdish political parties in the north.
The selection of a Kurdish president would most likely inflame the Sunnis in Iraq as well as nearly all other governments in the Arab world, which are dominated by Sunnis.
"If Talabani were rejected merely because of his ethnicity, then this would be relegating Kurds to the status of second-class citizens," Mr. Salih said. "And this is something that we would not accept."
Indeed, the stage seemed set for several days of intensive negotiations to determine the shape of the next government. With that in mind, Iraq's Shiite leaders sounded a conciliatory tone.
"This is a stage in Iraqi history when everyone must participate," said Haitham al-Husseini, a leader of the Shiite alliance. "We don't want to be the dominating power in the country."
Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company
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