Iraqi election facing threats of boycott

The evi­dence used by the Jus­tice and Accoun­tibil­ity Com­mit­tee against Al-Mutlaq, as Al-Adeeb one of the lead­ers of Dawa Party told Al-Mada:

Al-Mutlaq issued state­ments say­ing that there will be 40 Ba’ath mem­bers in the next parliament.

Strange and sur­prise is that, these are Ahmad Al-Chalabi’s words and not Mutlaq’s. Cha­l­abi told Al-Sharq Al-Awsat — 22-10-2009:

Cha­l­abi noted the pres­ence of Ba’athists and the rem­nants of the secu­rity ser­vices pub­licly, expected to obtain the required sup­port and this would ensure the Ba’athists 40 par­lia­men­tary seats in the next election.

In the absence of a polit­i­cal law in Iraq, it seems that the Jus­tice and Account­abil­ity Com­mit­tee plays this role, but the strange thing is that the Com­mit­tee itself is not a legal entity approved by the par­lia­ment, seven of its mem­bers did not receive the approval of par­lia­ment to work in the body.

Threat of a wide range boy­cott, faces the Iraqi elec­tion at the back­ground of the deci­sion made by the Jus­tice and Account­abil­ity of exclud­ing Salih Al-Mutlaq from par­tic­i­pat­ing in the com­ing Iraqi election.

Sunni leader held an urgent meet­ing today (par­tic­i­pants: Tariq Al-Hashimi, Iyad Allawi, Saleh Al-Mutlaq, Rafie Al-Issawi, Dhafir Al-Ani), and decided the following:

- A call to the all polit­i­cal sides to avoid this seri­ous mis­take, and deal with the issue as soon as pos­si­ble to main­tain the pos­i­tive atmos­phere that should pre­vail the elec­tion process to achieve its goals with integrity and transparency.

- The con­tin­u­a­tion of this posi­tion, will force the lead­ers of “Iraqi List” and all blocs and enti­ties allied with it to recon­sider its posi­tion on the elec­tions, which will put the polit­i­cal process at risk.

- The lead­ers affirm that they do not rec­og­nize the legal­ity or the legit­i­macy of what Mr. Lamy (Head of the J and A) has said, and will not deal with him. Democ­racy is the only option for the Iraqi people.

- The lead­ers call to freeze the Jus­tice and Account­abil­ity Com­mit­tee due to the fact that its deci­sion will not serve the national inter­est nor in the pro­mo­tion of democ­racy and the polit­i­cal process.

This deci­sion will increase Mutlaq’s pop­u­lar­ity among many Iraqis and “Sunni” neigh­bor­ing coun­tries. Mut­laq will be seen as “one man against sec­tar­ian division”.

Inten­sive con­tacts between Al-Mutlaq and num­ber of Arab cap­i­tals (Jor­dan, Saudi Ara­bia, Egypt and Qatar) in order to pres­sure the Iraqi gov­ern­ment and can­cel the Jus­tice and Account­abil­ity deci­sion. Secretary-General of the Arab League Amr Moussa to send a rep­re­sen­ta­tive to Bagh­dad to negotiate.

Maysoon Al-Damluji mem­ber of Allawi’s Iraqi list said:“The deci­sion will increase the sym­pa­thy with the Baathists and will lead to doubts in the legit­i­macy of elections”.

P.S.

One other impor­tant per­son excluded by the Com­mit­tee is Nehru Abdul Karim Al-Kasnazani, an Kurd leader of the Kas­nazani Sufis, his brother Gandhi runs many abroad Iraqi media (news­pa­pers and Satel­lite TV chan­nels), and was close to for­mer Vice Pres­i­dent Izzat Ibrahim Al-Douri.