Why is it odd? The Shi’a voted overwhelmingly for one party, certainly by US standards, but not entirely for one party. Allawi’s Iraqi list party took mostly Shi’a votes and got 13%, for example. Heck, assign even just the overall population’s 60% of those votes to Shi’ites and you’re at 55% for that group overall.
Cite? From the link to Asia Times in your Wikipedia link (my bolding):
Well, we’ll just have to wait and see. In the meantime, the Prime Minister has been chosen (Jaafari - I admit I know nothing of him) and it seems that a Kurdish president (less powerful in a parilamentary democracy than in a presidential democracy) might be all that is required for the supermajority. After the constitution is ratified, the Shia 48% could beome a majority simply by appealing to a smaller group: heck, even the communists might be enough. They could certainly strengthen their grip on power by making noises about future Kurdish independence, which would give Turkey the willies and risk destabilising the whole region.
One thing is more certain, however: Allawi is screwed, and the abysmal Sunni Arab turnout suggests that they are far more interested in insurgency than democracy.
In a generation or two, Iraq might not even exist, only a bigger Iran and Saudi Arabia and a new country called Kurdistan.
Uh, no. It suggests that some of them are interested in insurgency. Others were, but are not following the success of the elections. Others were never interested in insurgency but boycotted the election nonetheless because they thought at the time that the best way to make their political points was to join an organized boycott. Still others weren’t even interested in boycotting but stayed home out of fear.
John, yes, I certainly overstated the case there: Iran is less democratic than Sistani favours, but I understand that he still strongly advocates Sharia Law and other important elements of theocracy - his fantasy Iraqi government wouldn’t look that much different to Iran’s, IMO.
And all his statements from the last few decades were made under threat of assassination for the slightest undiplomatic phrase or suggestion. I think we’ll have to wait and see what he really advocates.
Because the Sunni didn’t vote much, to speak of. And, just as you say, the Shia voted “overwhelmingly” for the Sistani party. Hence, of the resulting pool of cast votes, the Shia should represent rather more than 60%, since the Sunnis were no shows. Roughly, what? 70 to 80% of the votes cast were cast by Shia, who, just as you say, voted “overwhelmingly” for the Sistani agenda.
And yet…by one of those near miraculous coincidences… the Sistani candidates didn’t manage to get more than 50% of the resulting vote.
Which is odd.
Well John, all that says is that Sistani doesn’t feel that clerics should undertake the actual running of the government. It still leaves him plenty of room to advocate basing government on Islamic principles.
As of last year (before it appeared inevitable that Sistani was going to be a major player in the new Iraqi government), some conservatives were indeed worried about his theocratic tendencies, which in some respects seemed possibly more extreme than Khomeini’s:
I certainly hope that Sistani does turn out to be at least a wise quasi-secularist. But I think it would be foolish to take it for granted that he “doesn’t advocate religion mixed with politics” just because he says he’s “against the mullaocracy”. Khomeini used to say that he was against it too.
What guarantees do you have Saudi Arabia will exist with the instability it has now?
Other than the fact Iraqi Shias are Arabs and that millions of them fought and died in the 8 year war aganst Iran, I have doubts Iran will incorporate anything. Even if they incorporated it as a satellite state, the resentment of the people would eventually turn to our favour, so they’re screwed either way.
Kurds will lose alot if they declare independence, they’ll lose everything they’ve worked for since the establishment of no fly zones in 1992. They’ll go for the federalist model, as this is the only way to ensure their complete rights and autonomy, with the protection of the state as well.
http://home.cogeco.ca/~kobserver/27-4-03-kurds-offer-model-irq.html
Translation, the elections are rigged, and you all know it. :rolleyes:
Still not seeing it. If the Sunnis were 0-shows, just for simplicity’s sake, Shi’a would be 75% of the remaining assuming equal turnout among Kurds and Shi’a. Say two thirds of Shi’ites voted for UIA – certainly overwhelming by US standards. That means (heh) 49.5% for that party. Add in that Kurdish turnout was higher than Shi’ite turnout and that Sunni turnout was above zero (unhappily not much above zero, but there will be more elections) and you’ve got a surprise that that single party did as well as it did, not as poorly.
That’s unclear, but even if it he wants Sharia law, he probably won’t get it. There is no reason to believe that the Kurdish and Sunni Arab provinces would ratify a constitution with a Shi’a version of Sharia law. It only takes 3 provinces to veto the consititution, and the Kurds and Sunni Arabs each have enough to force a veto by themselves.
The key element of Iranian “democracy” that surely will not be transplanted to Iraq is the power of an unelected Council of Guardians to veto candidates for any election. If Iran’s electoral process did not have that feature, that country would be a true democracy, and it would have an entirely different set of politicians running it today.
While the possibility of an all-out civil war in Iraq is real, and while it still may break apart in the future, the possibility of an Iranian style government is very remote-- there are too many internal (and external) factors working against it.
They did get more then 50% of the vote. See Tamerlane’s post. Also look at Squink’s link to turnout by province, the northern (Kurdish) provinces had higher turnout then the southern (Shia) provinces. Finally I think that the Kurds went to the polls with one issue in mind, autonomy, and thus voted for one party. The Shia, on the other hand, split their vote between the more religious party (UIA) and a minority voted for the more secular Allawi party.
I think your being too quick to jump to paranoid conclusions
So then can they do this with their 51%, without having to draw on other parties for votes?
Not quite yet. It seems the race is down to Jaafari and Chalabi.
That bit about 38 political parties, also helps to clarify the notion that Shiites ‘won a majority, or not’. Even if they did, it’s just an ‘umbrella group’ that has a majority. There’s little indication that the umbrella will coalesce into a single unified party.
sorry about the metaphor mangling, that umbrella bit doesn’t supply much to work with.
Perhaps. There is far more murk than clarity in the situation, one can only presume so much.
But clearly, the Bushiviks had a dog in the fight. They dream about an elected Shia theocracy taking power in Iraq and wake up screaming. So it was very important that the Shia party most inclined to theocracy and Sharia not get more than 50% of the vote. By a whisker, this appears to be the case.
Friend Manny almost agrees. He agrees that the “overwhelming” majority of Shia voters voted for the Sharia oriented party, but pegs his definition of “overwhelming” at precisely 2/3, which, by another remarkable coincidence, gives him the 49.5% result he needs. I have no definition of “overwhelming” to offer, but regard 2/3 as a bit scant. YMathMV.
So what you have is a series of improbabilites, IMHO, with results that, by the skin of the teeth, favor the Bushivik fantasy of a secular, federalized Iraq. So, of course, it is possible I am too paranoid. I am only suspicious, not convinced, and despair of any complete clarity.
Oh give me a break, I knew it’d take someone to come out and say the election was fake, because somehow the Shia didn’t take the two thirds they needed them too in order to prove Bush was wrong, and Iraq was becoming the next Iran. Get over it.
You got that right.
I am chastened by your rock-solid cites and evidence, Ryan. How can argue with someone like yourself who has all the relevent facts at his fingertips?
But I hasten to point out that I did not say the election, as a totality, was fake. Only that it strikes me as odd. One needn’t bugger an entire election process to shave a bit here, a bit there.
I am not sure, merely suspicious. You are entirely certain that my suspicions are unfounded. Very well, besides my obvious political slant, have you any other facts to support that conclusion, or are you content to rely with complete confidence on White House press releases?
But as has been stated, the Shia did receive more then 50% of the seats, so if the election was rigged to prevent this outcome, the riggers did a crummy job.
Manny was presuming that turn out was the same in Kurdish areas and Shiite ones, so in reality the precentage was probably more then 2/3. And that the Shiites didn’t all vote in lock step really doesn’t seem that suprising to me, certainly it’s a lot more likely then that the elections were rigged to give a result the US might of kind of sort of prefered.
It doesn’t seem too favorable to that, as already stated the Shia party still has the majority. Also, Bush’s clear favorite to win the election was Allawi’s party, which did worse then expected.
Just checking: Everyone in this thread is aware that the 50% thing is a purely symbolic number and that it takes 2/3 to form a government or proffer a constitution. Everyone knows that, right?
To be clear, I did no such thing. I picked an entirely hypothetical number which is a) not unreasonable in absense of differing data and b) reaches the result which the election commission announced. There was no attempt to be precise about anything, merely to show a not-unreasonable path to a conclusion which you found odd.
No. While I’m aware of the second part (2/3 majority necessary to form a government or ratify a constitution), that doesn’t imply that the 50% thing is symbolic.
The assembly elected two weeks ago will be Iraq’s functioning legislative branch until a new constitution is ratified. And there’s apparently nothing to suggest that 138 votes out of 275 will be insufficient to pass legislation during 2005. That’s not exactly symbolic.