Iraqis Continue to Vote, Despite Violence

Without the aid of foreign troops, like the U.S. Army, Iraq conducted their first democratic vote this week. The current Shi’ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki ran as the incumbent against a few other contenders. He is running for his third term, but it may be time for a change in Iraq because the country is still very dangerous and constantly experiencing a sectarian conflict filled with bloodshed.

The last of the American soldiers pulled out of the country in 2011 and there has been a constant stream of violence ever since. The U.S. topped Saddam Hussein in 2003, which may have ended his misdeeds, but cause the entire country to erupt in violence. The sectarian conflict is between the al Qaeda Sunni’s, who have been killing hundreds of civilians each month, and the Shi’ite militia who are enacting revenge for the killings of the civilians.

The vote that took place gave the people of Iraq a choice from almost 10,000 candidates of who to put in the 328-seat parliament. The political parties that have formed include very firm Islamists as well as liberals and communists. So far, the electoral commission has stated that about 60 percent of all the voters have cast ballots. The votes will probably take about three weeks to count and the results are expected by the end of May. As can be expected, it was very difficult for some in the outer suburbs to vote. Some even noted that Maliki may have been deliberately making things difficult so that they wouldn’t have a lot of representation in the next parliament. This sort of corruption is unfortunately commonplace in the newly established, sort of democracy. Muhannad Hussam is a candidate who supports Sunni deputy prime minister Saleh Mutlaq. Hussam says, “It was all to be expected…They didn’t want the Sunnis to move for the election.” He adds that, “From our view it is not a fair election.” Sunnis pointed out irregularities all over, like broken voting machines and armed groups outside of polling stations. The sectarian divide has gotten worse for this election as Maliki clings to power and violence deepens throughout the region.

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