Election Campaign Being Pushed In Nationalist Direction
24 January 2005 By Nicolas Rothwell, The Australian News
Tension, as much as anticipation, marks the run-up to Iraq's first democratic elections on Sunday, with political contenders making their last-minute pitches and insurgents pressing their violent campaign of intimidation.
On the campaign trail, a defiant appeal to nationalist sentiment was the key theme, and the prospect of a moderate Shia-dominated government determined to stress Iraqi control of national affairs solidified.
The most likely prime minister after Sunday's vote, Shia Muslim cleric Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, gave a strong signal that his electoral grouping, the United Iraqi Alliance - known simply as the "Shia House" - would push for U.S. forces to leave the country.
Mr. al-Hakim, in comments to London's The Sunday Times, spelled out his broad position and stressed that the government he hoped to form would ask for U.S. troops to withdraw as soon as possible.
"No people in the world accept occupation and nor do we accept the continuation of American troops in Iraq," he said.
"We regard these forces to have committed many mistakes in the handling of various issues, the first and foremost being that of security, which in turn has contributed to the massacres, crimes and calamities that have taken place in Iraq against the Iraqis."
The inevitable drift of the political campaign has been in this direction.
The Iraqi mainstream is increasingly being courted by a rhetoric of national unity and rebirth, which has the inevitable effect of painting the U.S. occupiers as extraneous forces.
After almost a year of intense political activity, under the cloak of constant insurgency and violence, a new political flavour is beginning to emerge in post-Saddam Iraq.
The nationalist message now predominating in a bid to knit together the country's fractured communities bears a distinct resemblance to the language deployed by the old dictator's Ba'ath Party.
Informant: Fred Feldman
From ufpj-news
Tension, as much as anticipation, marks the run-up to Iraq's first democratic elections on Sunday, with political contenders making their last-minute pitches and insurgents pressing their violent campaign of intimidation.
On the campaign trail, a defiant appeal to nationalist sentiment was the key theme, and the prospect of a moderate Shia-dominated government determined to stress Iraqi control of national affairs solidified.
The most likely prime minister after Sunday's vote, Shia Muslim cleric Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, gave a strong signal that his electoral grouping, the United Iraqi Alliance - known simply as the "Shia House" - would push for U.S. forces to leave the country.
Mr. al-Hakim, in comments to London's The Sunday Times, spelled out his broad position and stressed that the government he hoped to form would ask for U.S. troops to withdraw as soon as possible.
"No people in the world accept occupation and nor do we accept the continuation of American troops in Iraq," he said.
"We regard these forces to have committed many mistakes in the handling of various issues, the first and foremost being that of security, which in turn has contributed to the massacres, crimes and calamities that have taken place in Iraq against the Iraqis."
The inevitable drift of the political campaign has been in this direction.
The Iraqi mainstream is increasingly being courted by a rhetoric of national unity and rebirth, which has the inevitable effect of painting the U.S. occupiers as extraneous forces.
After almost a year of intense political activity, under the cloak of constant insurgency and violence, a new political flavour is beginning to emerge in post-Saddam Iraq.
The nationalist message now predominating in a bid to knit together the country's fractured communities bears a distinct resemblance to the language deployed by the old dictator's Ba'ath Party.
Informant: Fred Feldman
From ufpj-news
Starmail - 25. Jan, 11:12
