Crucial poll set to pave way for Iraq's future

by Chu Lan Huong

Iraq has just 10 more days to complete preparations for general elections in which almost 19 million citizens will vote under the watchful eye of both national and international observers.

The election could set the ravaged country on the path to peace and prosperity with the revitalisation of its war-battered economy.

Or it could spark a return to the bloody sectarian chaos that followed the invasion of the United States and its Coalition of the Willing in 2003.

It will also determine who governs Iraq, especially its rich oil fields, as most of the occupying troops withdraw by 2011.

Both United Nations and US officials hope the election will help Iraq's once dominant Sunni Muslims rejoin the political process and dampen their resentment at the rise to power of the Shiite majority - a resentment that still fuels a stubborn insurgency.

Violence in Iraq has ebbed over the last two years, but attacks remain common and are often blamed on Sunni insurgents, including al-Qaeda.

A series of bombings this month targeted poll candidates and al-Qaeda has vowed to try to prevent voting.

Iraqi security officials plan to deploy thousands of troops and police, restrict vehicle movement and impose curfews to prevent any attacks.

Air, sea and land travel between provinces will be banned on March 7 and 8.

Pre-election tension

In earlier January, Iraq's independent electoral commission banned about 500 candidates - more than 80 per cent of them Sunni nominees - from contesting the poll.

The Sunnis had been courted as election participants in a bid to prevent a re-run of the 2005 election which they boycotted with a subsequent descent into sectarian war that took three years to quell.

The electoral commission's decision prompted Sunni politicians to warn that Iraq was sliding towards a "dark unknown".

One of the country's two most prominent Sunni politicians, Saleh al-Mutlaq, has now withdrawn his party from the election and called on Sunni voters to boycott the polls.

Their compliance would be disastrous.

It would threaten both Iraq's post-war recovery and dispel the belief that the more than 100,000 foreign soldiers in the country were no longer needed.

There was no immediate response al-Mutlaq's call but if other Sunni parties oblige, the legitimacy of any new government becomes questionable.

The Shiites, united in the last election, are now also divided with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki standing alone after having decided that he could win without the help of his former allies.

The legacy of his decision could well end in turmoil if no one is strong enough to form a government as a result of the vote.

Sunni resentment

Western diplomats have warned against underestimating the resentment of Sunnis at their loss of power and the rise of Shiite political domination and fear their disenchantment could prompt them to rearm if they do not gain a fair stake in the new government.

The US ambassador to Baghdad, Christopher Hill, argues that the twin challenges of the elections are: Persuading the voters and rival factions to accept the result and then ensuring the losers step aside quietly.

"What will help determine whether these elections are successful or not is not the behaviour of the winners, but rather how the losers accept the elections," he says.

The parliamentary vote will likely shape Iraq's path for long after the US military withdraws.

It will also test Sunni-Shiite co-operation in the quelling of violence.

The vote, delayed from January, will be the last major election in which the US military is helping with security.

Some of Iraq's most ambitious goals are at stake.

These include political and sectarian reconciliation and finalising of a law governing the oil industry.

Iraqis, who are tired of the bloodshed between once dominant Sunnis and majority Shiites that erupted after the fall of Saddam Hussein, expect the election to herald a brighter future.

"I will go to vote even if I have to crawl because I do not want the past to be repeated," vowed one resident of Baghdad. — VNS