The Iraqi parliamentary elections are to be held today. While I will not venture into guessing who will win, – although tradition in the Arab countries is such that the ruling party or the loyalist camp is the side that usually wins –, I can safely say that one inevitable outcome of these elections will be that the defeated side will reject the results and claim that there was election fraud, and that there were pressures, bribery and corruption. Of course, the defeated side will be correct in this accusation, as the other tradition in the Arab countries is such that the election process is usually accompanied with practices that have nothing to do with democracy whatsoever. Then, there is a third tradition, with a result that I can make an educated guess on, and which namely is that the defeated side will remain defeated, despite the fact that the accusations this side makes are probably correct, and that those who are returning to power do not deserve it. The first stage of the elections, or the ‘special vote', ended as I predicted above: the lists of the State of Law Coalition led by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and the list of the Unity Alliance of Iraq led by the Interior Minister Jawad al-Bulani were ahead in the polls, or in other words, the two men who control the army and the different security forces and services were ahead of the others. Moreover, the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq admitted that there were violations, and pledged that it would investigate into these violations. However, this brings to mind a fourth tradition in Arab elections, which is that investigations never lead anywhere. There are hundreds of candidates competing for 325 seats. 306 political parties and organizations have registered their candidacy in the elections, including 251 that have become part of the electoral lists, while the rest has remained outside of the coalitions. In addition to the State of Law and Unity Alliance of Iraq (also known as al-Iraqiyya) coalitions, there are the National Iraqi Alliance and the Kurdistani List. However, the reader will be lost among all the names, parties and candidates, and with these in mind, he will not need to search for the Da'wa Party in this or that list, or the Supreme Islamic Council, the Sadrists, or even The Iraqi (non) National Congress, and its leader Ahmed Chalabi who came to Iraq on board an American tank and won half a percent of the vote in the 2005 elections. Subsequently, he learned his lesson, joined sides with Iran and became a member of the National Iraqi Alliance which succeeded the Unity Alliance of Iraq in the former elections. All of the above are details, and what is more important than them all is for the reader to realize that a very small minority of Iraqi politicians are working for the good of Iraq and for a better future for its people. As for the majority, it desires nothing else other than the heaven of being in power, in order to secure its own share of corruption money that took Iraq to the bottom of the global Corruption Perceptions Index (along with Afghanistan, the other country with American presence). We have been taught that ‘power seekers must not be given power'; since the vast majority are seekers of power and not of serving the people, then I can only pray that God have mercy on Iraq and its people. Naturally, the slogans of these candidates are the opposite of what I write here, and the readers are free to believe me or believe them. As for the Iraqi voters, all they have to do is ponder about why the candidates are inviting them to meals and giving them rice, sugar and frozen chicken, and sometimes even cash, which is more influential than anything else, and then recall the previous election campaign, trying to remember whether these gifts continued after the candidates' victory or defeat. The voter would soon discover that the winning candidate had turned his back on the voters, and the latter did not see the candidate again until five years later, with the start of the current election campaign. There are candidates from religious parties and others from secular ones. While these rival sides might perhaps portray the elections as a competition between these two lines – and it perhaps is -, the dominant feature of these elections is the competition over power by all available means, including the undemocratic means that are available to some. I realize that this analysis of the elections may perhaps be unfair to certain dedicated and patriotic Iraqi personalities. However, these are a minority, and I am talking about a majority, both in power and around power; a majority that has never served Iraq, and never will. In such a situation, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani is ahead of everyone in his patriotism and his commitment to the interests of the citizens. He repeatedly refused to support any party or candidate, and called on the Iraqis to choose the candidate that works for the interests of Iraq, its people and its stability. In truth, this last word is the key to the future of Iraq, as the first round of the elections witnessed violence and terrorist attacks, which will probably be repeated again today. Furthermore, the Americans are linking their withdrawal from Iraq to stability there, as there is a pledge by the Obama administration to withdraw in the dates he specified. There were 124 thousand U.S soldiers in Iraq last September, and now there are ninety thousand, of which fifty thousand will remain for training and other functions after next August, then all U.S forces and contractors will withdraw by the end of 2011. Also, terrorism and violence [in Iraq] prompted the war cabal to demand for prolonging the deployment of U.S troops beyond the dates specified for withdrawal. However, the Obama administration rejects this. In the end, I will personally forgive the winners in the elections all their mistakes and their sins if they defeat violence and push the Americans to withdraw and end the occupation of Iraq. [email protected]
