TNT: CandyKisses: President Saleh on the First Anniversary of the Early Elections: A Cruel Reminder of Missed Opportunities
A year has passed since the elections have not completed their constitutional entitlements. \
A harsh reminder of the missed opportunities for our country, and an important incentive for unity and inclusive national dialogue, the basis and end of which will be the interest of the nation and citizens and the fulfilment of their right to a free and dignified life.
It is time to end the spiral of crises and establish good governance.
Tishwash: A year after the elections, a report sheds light on the political reality in Iraq
Iraqis went out a year ago to vote in the first early elections, which came as a result of the pressures generated by the popular October protests, but the political parties are still witnessing inability to form a government in accordance with the benefits brought by the last elections, as well as their entry into a stifling crisis, Politicians have not found any way out so far.
The caretaker government, headed by Mustafa Al-Kazemi, continues to run the country’s affairs, despite the current pressures that Iraq is going through.
The percentage of voting boycotts in the legislative elections reached about 57%, as the High Elections Commission announced that the participation rate is estimated at 43%, and according to these figures, the percentage of boycotts exceeded that recorded in 2018, which was 44.5%, according to official figures.
Chest win:
The results announced by the Electoral Commission showed that the Sadrist bloc won the largest number of seats, as it won 73 seats out of 329 seats in the House of Representatives, followed by the “Taqaddam” bloc headed by the current Speaker of Parliament, Muhammad al-Halbousi, with 38 seats, and the State of Law bloc came in third place. With 37 seats.
Supporters of the Sadrist movement celebrated the emergence of its progress in the results, and rallies roamed the streets of the capital, Baghdad, raising Iraqi flags and pictures of Muqtada al-Sadr.
Muqtada al-Sadr described the elections as “the day of victory over the militias,” saying that “the time has come to disband the militias and confine weapons to the state.”
Appealing the results:
On the other hand, parties announced their appeal against the results of the early legislative elections, denouncing the occurrence of “manipulation” and “fraud.”
The gains of the Al-Fateh Alliance led by Hadi Al-Amiri declined, as it won 14 seats after it had won 45 seats in the previous elections in 2018, while the State of Law coalition, headed by former Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki, managed to achieve more than 30 seats, and the Al-Fateh Alliance scored more than 30 seats. Which represents the Popular Mobilization, a significant setback in the new parliament, which prompted it to form alliances.
Formation of the coordinating framework:
The coordination framework was formed on October 11, 2021, with the aim of coordinating the positions of the Shiite forces rejecting the preliminary results of the early parliamentary elections, which demanded that they be recounted manually, due to the significant decrease in the number of their seats compared to the previous elections.
It includes 130 parliamentarians with the aim of forming a consensus government, and the leader of the Sadrist movement, Muqtada al-Sadr, opposed it, demanding a political majority government in which other forces did not participate.
Single meeting:
In December 2021, the Shiite house met in the house of the head of the Fatah Alliance Hadi al-Amiri, in a meeting that brought together Muqtada al-Sadr and the forces of the coordinating framework, including Nuri al-Maliki, Haider al-Abadi, Qais Khazali, Faleh al-Fayyad, and Ammar al-Hakim.
After the meeting, al-Sadr announced that the next Iraqi government would be a “national majority government, neither eastern nor western,” in a tweet to him on Twitter.
Al-Halbousi’s election:
On January 9, 2022, the new Iraqi parliament elected Muhammad al-Halbousi as its speaker after a first session of the Parliament, which was characterized by chaos and altercations between representatives and tension between the Sadrist movement and the “Iran-backed” parties and groups.
The session witnessed violent altercations and chaos, during which the head of the session, which was chaired by the oldest MP, Mahmoud al-Mashhadani, 73, was subjected to an “assault,” after which he was taken to the hospital.
“Save a Homeland” announcement:
On March 23, 2022, the “Save a Homeland” alliance was announced, bringing together the “Sadr movement” led by Muqtada al-Sadr, and the “Sovereignty” alliance, the political representative of the Sunni Arabs in Iraq, led by Khamis al-Khanjar (the alliance includes the “Progress” movement led by Muhammad al-Halbousi and the Azm Movement, and the ruling Kurdistan Democratic Party in the Kurdistan region led by Massoud Barzani. The coalition succeeded in gathering about 180 deputies in Parliament.
The nomination of Jaafar al-Sadr
On the same day, al-Sadr announced the nomination of the Iraqi ambassador in London, Jaafar al-Sadr, to head the new government, but after the Sadrist bloc’s decision to resign from Parliament, Jaafar al-Sadr announced his withdrawal from the nomination.
The Broken Three”
“Save the homeland” lost its mainstay with the withdrawal of the Sadrists from Parliament and the political process as a whole, in June 2022 after his failure to form the government due to the “blocking third” in the House of Representatives, which was like a “stick in the wheel” that obstructed the election of the presidents of the republic and government.
The Federal Court of Iraq stipulated, during a statement on February 3, 2022, that Parliament elect a President of the Republic from among the candidates for the position by a two-thirds majority of the total members. The quorum is achieved by the presence of two-thirds (220) of the total number of parliament members (329).
The forces of the coordination framework headed by al-Maliki and al-Amiri managed to gather more than a third of the Iraqi parliament, and disrupted the two sessions of electing the president of the republic for two consecutive times.
In turn, the Supreme Judicial Council decided, on April 3, 2022, the constitutionality of the blocking third in the Iraqi parliament.
The President of the Council, Judge Faiq Zeidan, said in a televised interview, “The term guarantor or blocking third has no text in the constitution,” adding that “the Federal Court has worked hard to keep the President of the Republic in his position because this case does not apply to the constitutional text of the vacancy of the position.”
green events
On July 30, al-Sadr called on his followers to storm the Green Zone and sit inside the parliament building, to prevent the holding of any sessions that might lead to the formation of a government led by the Coordination Framework forces that have become constitutionally qualified to nominate their candidate for prime minister and assign him by the elected president of the republic to form the new government.
Two weeks after al-Sadr’s supporters stormed parliament and demanded the judiciary to dissolve it, in the context of his call for new elections, supporters of the “coordinating framework” carried out their own sit-in in Baghdad to pressure for the formation of a new government.
Both factions have set up competing camps in Baghdad, where Sadr’s supporters are located inside the Green Zone, while their opponents, the supporters of the “coordinating framework”, are spread outside it.
Al-Haeri announces his “famous” fatwa
The Shiite religious authority, Kazem Al-Hairi, issued a statement on August 29, 2022, declaring not to continue as a religious authority and to “drop all agencies and permissions issued by us or by our offices and not to receive any legitimate rights by our agents and representatives on our behalf as of the date of this announcement.” According to the statement.
Al-Haeri justified his decision with “illness and advanced age” and demanded “obedience to the leader of the Islamic Revolution, Ali Khamenei,” on the grounds that he is “the most worthy and most qualified to lead the nation and manage the struggle with the forces of oppression.”
Hours later, Muqtada al-Sadr announced his retirement from political work, and said in a statement that he was retiring from political work permanently after “I wanted to make the distortion that was caused by the Shiite political forces.”
Al-Sadr said that Al-Haeri’s retirement “was not of his own free will,” adding: “I have never claimed infallibility or diligence, not even (the leadership), but I enjoin good and forbid evil … I only wanted to bring them (Shiite political forces) closer to their people and to feel with his suffering.”
In a final attempt to exclude the coordination framework, groups of the Sadrist movement stormed the Green Zone for more than 18 hours on August 29 and 30, then withdrew after a directive from their leader.
11 initiatives to solve a crisis
Various political parties advanced, about 11, to solve the crisis of forming the government, but they all failed to bring the two main camps of the crisis, the “Sadr movement” and the “coordinating framework” together.
Among the 11 initiatives, 3 of them were for the coordination framework, 3 were for the Sadrist movement, an initiative by independent representatives, an initiative by the civil “extension” movement, an initiative by Sunni political forces, and two initiatives by Kurdish forces, without leading to any solutions.
Sudanese nomination
On July 25, 2022, the “Coordination Framework” announced the nomination of Muhammad Shia Al-Sudani, for the position of Prime Minister of the next government
Formation of a “state administration coalition”
The State of Law coalition, led by Nuri al-Maliki, announced on September 24, 2022, the formation of the “Coalition of State Administration” and includes (the coordination framework, the Alliance of Resolve, the Alliance of Sovereignty, the Democratic Party, the National Union, the Babylon Bloc) to form the new Iraqi government, without success so far. .
The crisis of forming the new government is one of the most complex political crises that Iraq has witnessed since 2003. According to the prevailing political norm in Iraq after the first parliamentary elections in 2005, Shiites head the government, Kurds head the republic and Sunnis head parliament.
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Fatah: The President of the Republic will be elected next week, and a delegation including Al-Fayyad and Al-Halbousi will visit Erbil.
The head of the Fatah Alliance parliamentary bloc, Abbas Al-Zamili, expects the election of the President of the Republic in the House of Representatives early next week.
Al-Zamili said in the program “Al-Mastra” broadcast by Al-Furat satellite channel this evening: “We are moving towards the election of the president of the republic and the formation of the government for a short period of time.” If they do not reach an agreement, parliament will have to choose one of the candidates, but we do not want to reach this stage.”
He added, “Before the middle of this month and the beginning of next week, a president will be elected if a channel of communication and understanding is not opened with Mr. Sadr.”
He revealed, “The visit of a delegation (from the State Administration Coalition), including the head of the Popular Mobilization Authority, Faleh al-Fayyad, and Parliament Speaker Muhammad al-Halbousi, to Erbil, to meet with the leaders of the Kurdistan Democratic Party to discuss political affairs and efforts to complete the constitutional entitlements.”
Al-Zamili called “the two Kurdish parties to reach an understanding, either by agreeing on one presidential candidate or going to parliament with two candidates,” noting that “the framework is pressing in this direction and resolving the matter in the near term and as political forces called upon to save the country by completing the political benefits.”
He stressed, “We are ready to negotiate to a maximum point with the Sadrist movement, despite our knowledge that the movement’s decision is exclusively in the hands of Mr. Muqtada al-Sadr,” noting that “the framework candidate, Muhammad Shia al-Sudani, is a person who enjoys the confidence and acceptance of the majority of political forces,” as he put it.
And on the draft law on addressing housing abuses, Al-Zamili said: “The framework rejected the slums law, but the parliament speaker insisted on reading it first.”
He explained, “We are in favor of going towards land ownership as a reality, especially in the (agricultural title),” noting that “this law will be transferred to the new government.” link
buuuuuuuut…
The rule of law denies holding a session to choose the president of the republic next Wednesday: a decisive meeting only
Today, Sunday, the leader of the State of Law coalition, Turki Al-Atabi, denied holding .a session to choose the president of the republic next Wednesday
Al-Otbi said in an exclusive statement to (Baghdad Today) that “on Wednesday, we will hold a meeting with a Kurdish delegation in Baghdad to resolve the position of “.President of the Republic
He continued, “We hope that the Kurdish delegation will present a consensual “.candidate, otherwise our option will be to repeat the 2018 scenario again Al-Otbi expected, “The decision session will be held next week because the situation “.in the country requires action in order to start forming the government link
