President Masoud Barzani receives Sadrist and Sunni coalition allies to discuss Iraqi government formation 

Rebar Ahmed, the current KDP nominee for the Iraqi presidency, attended the meeting with other party officials. 
Kurdistan Region Deputy Speaker of Parliament (top right) receives Iraqi Speaker of Parliament and the Sadrist delegation in Erbil, May 9, 2022. (Photo: Handout/Hemn Hawrami)
Kurdistan Region Deputy Speaker of Parliament (top right) receives Iraqi Speaker of Parliament and the Sadrist delegation in Erbil, May 9, 2022. (Photo: Handout/Hemn Hawrami)

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – President of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) Masoud Barzani met with Sadrist and Sunni politicians to discuss the government formation process in Iraq.

The delegation consisted of Iraqi Speaker of Parliament Mohammad Al-Halboosi, head of the Sunni Sovereignty Alliance Khamis Al-Khanjar, and head of the Sadrist parliamentary bloc Hassan Al-Ethari, Kurdistan 24 has learned. 

They discussed the “political situation in Iraq, the formation of the new government cabinet, and Muqtada Al-Sadr’s latest initiative,” according to the information obtained by Kurdistan 24. 

Rebar Ahmed, the current KDP nominee for the Iraqi presidency, attended the meeting with other party officials. 

The meeting came shortly after Sadrist leader Muqtada al-Sadr’s 40-day deadline for his main rival, the Shiite Coordination Framework, to form a government after the holy month of Ramadan and the Eid al-Fitr holiday expired. 

Since the Framework failed to form a government in this timeframe, Sadr announced another initiative, calling on “independent members of parliament” to form a government his coalition would vote into power.

Barzani’s KDP is part of the tripartite electoral coalition that calls itself Saving the Homeland. That coalition holds almost 180 seats out of the Iraqi parliament’s 329, making it the largest. 

More than six months have passed since the Oct. 10, 2021 elections, and the Iraqi parties have not been able to form a new government as the two main coalitions are pushing for two very different forms of government. 

The Saving of the Homeland calls for a majority government, while the Framework insists on another consensus government. All of Iraq's post-2003 governments have been consensus-based.