World

PM Abadi leading in Iraq election

May 13, 2018
A handout picture released by Iraq's Prime Minister's Media Office on Saturday shows PM Haider Al-Abadi arriving at a poll station in the capital Baghdad's Karrada district. — AFP
A handout picture released by Iraq's Prime Minister's Media Office on Saturday shows PM Haider Al-Abadi arriving at a poll station in the capital Baghdad's Karrada district. — AFP

BAGHDAD — Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi's list appears to be leading in Iraq's parliamentary election followed by Shiite cleric Moqtada Al-Sadr's alliance, an election commission source and a security official said.

The sources cited unofficial initial results.

Iraqis voted on Saturday in the first election since the defeat of Daesh militants inside the country. Final results are expected on Monday.

Turnout was low at around 45 percent, according to the election commission.

Abadi, a rare ally of both the United States and Iran, was mainly concerned with fending off Shiite groups other than Sadr's alliance, which are seeking to pull the country closer to Tehran.

If the Sadr list finished second, that would mark a surprise comeback by the cleric.

Iraqis on Saturday inflicted a blow on a political class they view as corrupt by shunning the first legislative elections.

More than half of the nearly 24.5 million voters did not show up at the ballot box in the parliamentary election, the highest abstention rate since the first multiparty elections in 2005, although it passed off largely peacefully.

The poll -- in which turnout was just 44.52 percent -- came with tensions surging between key powers Iran and the US after Washington pulled out of a landmark 2015 nuclear deal, sparking fears of a destabilizing power struggle over Iraq.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo lauded the vote and called in a statement for an "inclusive government, responsive to the needs of all Iraqis".

Many Iraqis -- especially the country's disenfranchised youth -- skipped the vote, complaining they saw few prospects that the poll would improve their lives.

While voting stations in the capital were sparsely attended, in some parts of the country there seemed greater interest in the election.

In Mosul -- still partly in ruins from the months-long fight to oust the group -- residents queued up to make their choice as they look to recover from Daesh rule.

The governor of Iraq's Kirkuk province declared a curfew on Saturday and ordered a manual recount of votes there in the national election, saying an electronic counting system had produced an "illogical" result.

Rakan Al-Jubouri, governor of the northern oil-rich region, announced a curfew from midnight until 6 a.m. (0300 GMT) to prevent any ethnic or sectarian tension between its Kurdish, Arab and ethnic Turkmen communities.

Al-Jubouri did not elaborate in his statement on the problem with the vote-counting system.

In October, Iraqi forces backed by Shiite militias dislodged Kurdish Peshmerga fighters who had taken control of Kirkuk city in 2014, preventing its capture by Daeshmilitants who had overrun Iraqi army positions in northern and western Iraq. — Agencies


May 13, 2018
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