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MULTIMEDIA
May 27, 2012
 
 
 
 
 
 

ICG calls for attention to post-election process in Iraq

Joost Hiltermann
4 March 2010 / EMINE KART, İSTANBUL
When compared to earlier election experiences in Iraq in the aftermath of the US-led invasion, Sunday’s parliamentary elections in the neighboring country have a different particularity -- they will be the last elections before a planned major withdrawal of US forces from the country.

According to Joost Hiltermann of the Brussels-based International Crisis Group (ICG), this fact needs to be highlighted as much as possible to draw attention to the responsibilities of the international community, particularly the United States, in the post-election process.

Iraqis have become quite familiar with the culture of elections in the last few years, Hiltermann, deputy program director for the Middle East and North Africa at the ICG, suggested at a roundtable meeting hosted on Tuesday at the Ankara-based Turkish Economic Policy Research Foundation (TEPAV).

Yet the point is not doing away with the elections but forming the government, with several options for a probable coalition government, Hiltermann said, emphasizing the absence of independent institutions and the presence of a partisan judiciary as factors that would not be helpful at all in this process of forming a new government.

The problem is the timing of forming the new government amid the planned withdrawal of US forces -- a coincidence that might have a fatal outcome due to the possibility of a new wave of violence after the elections, the senior researcher remarked. “After the elections, there will be a lot of kingmakers. The weakness of ‘independent’ institutions may lead to violence,” since the sympathizers of certain political parties within those institutions would rather follow their party’s line along the process instead of assuming what their positions at those institutions require, he said.

Hiltermann, right from the beginning, before the US invaded Iraq in 2003, strongly opposed such a move. Yet he believes that the US has certain unfulfilled responsibilities in Iraq given that the invasion took place and should focus on the post-election process without caving in to being satisfied with having a “proper” election in the country.

A likely vacuum in Iraq in the aftermath of elections would have fatal outcomes, he reiterated. In a report released late last month, titled “Iraq’s Uncertain Future: Elections and Beyond,” the ICG had already warned that “the focus on electoral politics is good, no doubt, but the run-up has highlighted deep-seated problems that threaten the fragile recovery: recurring election-related violence; ethnic tensions over Kirkuk; the re-emergence of sectarianism; and blatant political manipulation of state institutions.”

In its recommendations to the international community -- “notably the United Nations, the European Union and the United States” -- the ICG report called for “encouraging the independence of the institutions and agencies involved in the electoral process, notably the Supreme Court and IHEC [the Independent High Electoral Commission], as well as the military and police; encouraging political and institutional reform following the elections, especially of the Accountability and Justice Commission, and pushing for political independence of the judiciary and independent commissions.”
 
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