Kurdish parties step up calls to cancel election results

Kurdish parties alleging fraud in Iraq's May 12 election on Tuesday reiterated calls for the implementation of a parliamentary decision to recount votes and cancel some of the results.

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Kurdish parties alleging fraud in Iraq's May 12 election on Tuesday reiterated calls for the implementation of a parliamentary decision to recount votes and cancel some of the results.

“We call for the rejection of the election,” based upon claims of “evidence [of fraud] we have put forth to the officials in charge,’” Coalition for Democracy and Justice (CDJ) member Dalil Hawrami told Kurdistan 24.

Shortly after the election, six Kurdish political parties, with the notable exception of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), called for a full manual recount of votes cast in the Kurdistan Region and disputed territories.

In a majority vote, the Iraqi parliament two weeks ago ruled to dismantle the much of the work of the Independent High Electoral Commission (IHEC), manually recount all votes, and cancel a portion of them. Though Iraq's constitution does not give parliament jurisdiction over elections, the Higher Judicial Council approved the resolution shortly afterward.

Since then, IHEC's commissioners have been replaced with nine judges, but other provisions in the resolution await implementation.

An official from the Kurdistan Islamic Union (KIU), another party that sides with the CDJ in its call to reject election results, said it should be a precondition for “going to Baghdad and partaking in government formation.”

Sherwan Sherwani, the official, also claimed that “with the manual recount of the votes, 50 percent of the votes in Kurdistan Region will change, especially those of Union (KIU). If there is fraud in the recounts, too, then that is another matter.”

In Baghdad, al-Hikma alliance leader Ammar al-Hakim suggested an opposition coalition between the parties that disagree with the election results. In response, both the CDJ and KIU reiterated that they would wait for the execution of the law then consider options of such a coalition.

With widespread controversy over a newly-introduced electronic ballot-casting system and allegations of fraud, the Kurdistan Region's Independent High Elections and Referendum Commission (IHERC) decided to return to the old system of manual vote-counting in its upcoming vote to appease the demands of the complaining parties.

The regional election will take place on Sept. 30 of this year. 38 parties have registered, but as the outcome of May's disputed election is far from clear, no coalitions between them have been announced.

Editing by John J. Catherine

(Kurdistan 24 correspondent Karwan Rahman contributed to this report)