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Iraq and the 2018 Election

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BRIEFING PAPER Number CBP 8337, 12 June 2018 Iraq and the 2018 By Ben Smith election Contents: 1. Background 2. Election 2018 3. Domestic scene 4. Outlook www.parliament.uk/commons-library | intranet.parliament.uk/commons-library | [email protected] | @commonslibrary 2 Iraq and the 2018 election Contents Summary 3 1. Background 5 1.1 Old Parliament 5 1.2 Electoral system 5 2. Election 2018 6 2.1 Disparate election coalitions 6 Shiites 6 Kurds 8 Secularists and Sunnis 9 2.2 Election outcome 10 Turnout 10 Results 11 Winners and losers 11 Disputes 11 3. Domestic scene 13 3.1 Destruction and reconstruction 13 Conference 13 3.2 Persistent violence and human rights abuse 14 4. Outlook 16 4.1 Forming a government 16 Abadi to stay? 16 Sovereign ministries 16 4.2 Iran and Saudi Arabia 17 Saudi Arabia 17 Iran 17 4.3 Rebuilding the State 18 Cover page image copyright Workers rebuilding Ramadi town, Iraq by Ben Barber, USAID. Licensed under Public Domain Certification / image cropped. 3 Commons Library Briefing, 12 June 2018 Summary Campaigning for the 2018 election to Iraq’s Council of Representatives began on 14 April, with major themes being the victory over ISIS/Daesh; Iraqi nationalism and the relationship with Iran and the US; sectarianism; and corruption and the delivery of Government services. Iraq elected its Parliament on 12 May 2018. Disparate coalitions Iraq’s political scene is highly fragmented and constantly changing. There was a total of 36 coalitions, each made up of several parties. The three most successful coalitions were completely new. Incumbent Haider al-Abadi was expected to do well, after his declaration of victory over ISIS in December 2017. He mishandled the formation of his Nasr (victory) coalition and tarnished his nationalist credentials, however. Moqtada al-Sadr, former leader of the Mahdi Army militia, associated himself with widespread secular protests against corruption and mismanagement that had taken place for several months before the poll. His Saairun (Forward) coalition, also known as Alliance of Revolutionaries for Reform, brought Communists (who had played an important role in the demonstrations) together with his more familiar Shiite allies. Another new coalition was led by Hadi al-Amiri, former rival militia leader to Sadr. The Fatah (Conquest) coalition represented the Shiite militias that were important in defeating ISIS, although the militias themselves were banned from presenting candidates. Fatah is close to Iran. Abadi’s predecessor Nouri al-Maliki led his State of Law alliance, as he had done at the last election. The Kurds did not unify around a single coalition. The independence referendum and declaration in 2017, followed by the loss of the disputed city of Kirkuk, caused splits in the traditional ruling duopoly composed of the KDP and the PUK. Some secularists and Arab Sunni parties called for a delay in the election because so many people were displaced by the fight against ISIS. Former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi’s Iraqiya coalition was the most important of these. Results At 44%, turnout was the lowest for any election since 2003. This time, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the leading Shiite cleric in Iraq, did not say it was the duty of Shiites to vote. Moqtada al-Sadr’s Saairun coalition came first, with 54 seats in the 329-seat parliament. Next came Amiri’s Fatah alliance with 47, followed by the incumbent’s Nasr coalition with 42 seats, a surprisingly poor result for Haider al-Abadi. Maliki’s State of Law coalition lost 67 seats compared with the last election. There were widespread allegations of vote-rigging and some coalition leaders called for a re-run of the election. The outgoing parliament called for a manual re-count. In June, an unexplained fire broke out in one of the warehouses where Baghdad ballot papers were stored. Domestic scene The election took place against a background of massive destruction resulting from the battle against ISIS/Daesh. The Iraqi Government requested $100 billion at a reconstruction 4 Iraq and the 2018 election conference in Kuwait, but donors only pledged $30 billion, mostly in credit lines. Iraq will struggle to take on more debt; corruption is also a hindrance. Meanwhile, the battle against ISIS is not completely over yet: bomb blasts are still taking place, particularly around Kirkuk. Prosecuting the atrocities that took place remains controversial, with a UN Investigative Team set only to investigate ISIS’s crimes. Forming a government Forming a government may take time. Saairun may be the biggest coalition, but Sadr himself has ruled out being Prime Minister and has limited the other coalitions he will work with. Prime Ministers in Iraq are often compromise candidates anyway, rather than coming from the leading coalition. That means that Abadi has a good chance of remaining Prime Minister. While Sadr has called for a technocratic government, allocating ministries to the various groups that will be needed to form a government remains a problem; they have traditionally been centres of patronage and have not collaborated well. Saudi Arabia has been rebuilding ties with Iraqi politicians and with the Iraqi economy. As a way of countering Iranian influence, this is very different from the strategy in Yemen, for example. No rupture with Iran is likely, however. With no strong majority, whatever government is formed will continue to struggle to implement any thoroughgoing reforms. 5 Commons Library Briefing, 12 June 2018 1. Background ISIS/Daesh was expelled from Iraq’s second-biggest city, Mosul, in July 2017, having been in control for three years. Iraqi parliamentary elections were originally due to be held in September 2017 but under the circumstances, it was not possible to provide for an election campaign while the battle against the jihadi group was continuing, so the Government in Baghdad postponed it until May 2018. Even with the final victory declared against ISIS declared in December 2017, violence continued. ISIS is still carrying out regular attacks in northern and central Iraq. Added to that, the government of the Kurdish Autonomous Region held a referendum in September 2017 and subsequently declared independence. Baghdad’s response was to retake control of territories disputed between the Kurds and central government, with the help of Iran-backed militias, throwing Kurdish politics into disarray. 1.1 Old Parliament Iraqi Council of Representatives, April 2014 The State of Law alliance (including affiliates) 94 Sadrist Movement 31 Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq 30 Mutahhidun (largely Sunni - Osama al-Nujaifi) 28 Wataniya (Ayad Allawi) 21 Kurdistan Democratic Party 25 Patriotic Union of Kurdistan 19 Gorran 9 Source: Europa World Online 1.2 Electoral system Iraq’s Council of Representatives is elected on a proportional system, with each of the 18 governorates counting as a constituency and differing numbers of Members elected to each from an open list, distributed according to the Saint-Laguë method. The candidate who secures the highest number of votes on the list is elected while ensuring that a woman candidate is elected after every three winning male candidates, meaning that 25% of seats go to women.1 Added to the 320 regular seats are eight reserved for minorities, attached to certain governorates. Of Baghdad’s seats, one is reserved for Christians and one for Sabeans. One of Dahuk’s seats is reserved for Christians, as is one of Erbil’s seats. Kirkuk has one Christians seat. Ninewa has one seat each for Christians, Yazidis and Shabaks. 1 Inter Parliamentary Union, Council of Representatives of Iraq 6 Iraq and the 2018 election 2. Election 2018 2.1 Disparate election coalitions Shiites Iraqi Shiites have a mixed record of uniting to take advantage of their numerical strength, but they have been more successful at uniting than the Sunnis. Also, Sunni turnout has often been lower. In 2010, the secularist/Sunni Iraqiya coalition topped the polls, showing that identity politics was not a failsafe way of ensuring Shiite dominance. After the election, the Shia pulled together again and were able to form a government without Iraqiya. After that brush with defeat, Maliki moved closer to Iran. In 2018, that Shiite strength may be changing: the division between the Abadi, Maliki and Sadr camps is greater than previous differences, and may herald a broader change, where confessional and ethnic identities, dominant in Iraqi politics since 2003, lose some of their importance. Abadi Haider al-Abadi heads the Victory (Nasr) Alliance electoral coalition. He based his campaign on the Iraqi forces’ victory against ISIS/Daesh, claiming in December 2017: We have accomplished a very difficult mission. Our heroes have reached the final strongholds of Daesh and purified it. The Iraqi flag flies high today over all Iraqi lands.2 Abadi also took a hard line on the Kurdish referendum and, with the help of Iran, re-established central government control over the disputed territory of Kirkuk. At first sight, that was a strong position. The instability of Iraq’s party system has made things difficult for him, however. Hampered by the earlier mishandling of his coalition launch in January, Abadi appeared to sell out his nationalist credentials in order to guarantee his re-election through a deal with Iran-backed factions of the Fatah Alliance, led by the Badr Organisation, only to see this deal fall through. Also, one of Abadi’s allies in the Dawa Party alleged that Abadi had also reached a secret agreement with his predecessor as Prime Minister,
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