Iraqi legislative: Allawi and Maliki engaged in a very close fight
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BAGHDAD - Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and his rival, Iyad Allawi were engaged Wednesday in a legislative battle extremely tight, according to calculations by the AFP after 80% of the recount, the same number of seats in Parliament.
- In terms of votes, Mr. Allawi, a former prime minister, managed to regain the upper hand and now ahead of his rival of a very thin margin of 8984 votes, according to incomplete results of the election commission.
According to calculations by AFP, the lists of both candidates would get 87 each of the 310 seats in the next meeting. Fifteen other parliamentary seats (reserved for minorities in particular) are not included in these calculations.
The list of the Iraqi National Alliance (NNA), which consists of Shiite religious parties, would get to 67 seats this time and the list of the two major Kurdish parties 38.
The votes of Iraqis abroad and security services have not yet been incorporated by the electoral commission in the results and could greatly alter the deal, particularly in Baghdad, which has the largest pool of seats.
"The results announced yesterday (Tuesday) show that we were in the lead since the first election day. The Iraqi Bloc will stay ahead because the project represents the Iraqi national identity," said Haidar al - Mulla, candidate on the list of Mr. Allawi.
With results also tightened, negotiations to form the next government will be long and both candidates will try to form coalitions in parliament for the post of prime minister.
Immediately after the announcement of new results, accusations of fraud have been launched by the Prime Minister's camp when they were issued in recent days by Iraqi Bloc.
Ennaharonline/ M. O
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