Election chaos in Iraq is leading to uncontrollable points with confrontations taking more severe face. Friday protests led to some casualties promising more violence on way.
Protesters condemning “fraud” clashed with police units around Baghdad’s Green Zone. Demonstrations against the results of the October polls is leading Iraq to an election chaos. Yesterday, the protesters went a step further to throw stones at guards. The police responded by firing tear gas and air shot to take the condition under control.
The sound of shooting was in the air from time to time on the demonstration site, with at least 2 demonstrators reported killed and scores more injured. The number of victims has yet to be confirmed by the authorities. The outcome of last month’s legislative election indicated that the prominent Sadr faction gained the highest number of seats while still failing to secure the majority.
Early results announced the Fatah coalition, the political branch of the influential Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) gained roughly 15 seats. The faction had 48 seats in the former period, securing its place as the second controlling faction at the parliament.
Discontented demonstrators found Friday the final opportunity for the administration and election committee to launch a recount process to the entire ballots. After the polls, the country’s nonpartisan election committee obtained over 1,300 appeals from the “Shiite cooperation framework” — an ad hoc coalition made up largely of Shiite factions that believed the election was rigged.
The committee, however, dismissed most of the objections after a primary review, claiming the “lack of evidence” as the reason. The committee will reveal its final conclusions on the remaining appeals before sending them to the High Court for confirmation. The timing for final announcement of the results is unclear removing the chance for a termination to the election chaos.
Election Chaos; Roots and Reasoning
Iraq’s officials say they launched an inquiry into the casualties and violence against the people by security units during Baghdad protests. After confrontations between Iraqi troops and advocates of parties protesting the outcomes of the parliamentary election, Iraqi Prime Minister formed a commission to investigate.
“The negligent will be brought to legal accountability for their negligence and violation of the explicit orders of the commander in chief, which stressed that live bullets should not be fired under any circumstances,” a statement by Joint Operations Command emphasized.
For the first time since the October election, major violent encounter between regime troops and opposition groups took place. Among the protesters were the people who didn’t take part in the election due to distrust with the election process.
The October election, which took place years ahead of time, occurred amid considerable dissatisfaction with Iraq’s political establishment. Turnout was frustratingly unprecedented since the downfall of Saddam in 2003. Only 41% of Iraqi people cast their vote on October 10.
“So many people in the streets say that they do not believe in this electoral process, because it’s only reproducing the same old parties,” a reporter said in Iraq. A major part of people’s discontent with the election in Iraq was due to loss of trust with the results. The current election chaos proves that these concerns were not irrelevant and higher turnout may have led to tenser conditions.
The election chaos found new dimensions with the release of a report revealing election hack. The hackers, originating in Israeli, found access to Emirati servers and obtained the data of 9.6 million voters. To make it more perplexing, UAE and Israel have inked security treaties in recent months starting at Dubai Expo 2020.
