January election date brings fear of intimidation and violence

Iraq has set a 30 January date for the country's first elections since the downfall of Saddam Hussein, putting an end to speculation that the process could go ahead amid continuing violence. But many ordinary Iraqis say that insecurity will keep people away from the polls. Some Iraqis have already received threats that they will be killed if they try to vote on election day, Salah Omar, 31, a trader in Baghdad, told IRIN. “Insurgents are threatening to bomb all polling stations,” Omar said. “If it’s held on 30 January, many people will not vote, because they are so afraid.” Culture ministry worker Warka Yahiya, 22, agreed. “Of course I want to vote, especially because there will be women on the list,” she told IRIN. “But I’m afraid election day will be very scary.” There have also been allegations that insurgents were trying to buy voter registration cards, Safwat Rashid, an Iraqi independent election commissioner, told IRIN. Added to this, militants were threatening those who distributed the cards, he said. “These (voter registration) papers have nothing to do with the actual polling papers on election day,” Rashid said. “All they have to do with is the names of the people who can vote.” The Independent Election Commission, set up in the summer with the help of the UN to run the elections, is creating voter registers through the country’s food ration card system, in which a food basket is distributed once a month to each family in the country under the former United Nations Oil-for-Food Programme, now run by the Ministry of Trade. Elections will be held for a 275-member parliamentary body; for a Kurdish regional parliament and for 15 regional governorates. Voters will choose candidates based on a loose “party list” system that can include as few as 12 or as many as 275 candidates. Every third candidate on the list must be a woman to ensure that at least 25 percent of the newly elected parliamentary body are women, according to the transitional administrative law written by US-led administrators. “We are scared to vote, or even to find our registration information, because we are from Fallujah,” Emad Mohammed, 38, told IRIN. An Iraqi Army major under former president Saddam Hussein, he recently fled fighting between US forces and insurgents in Fallujah and rented a temporary apartment in Baghdad. The Sunni city of Fallujah, 65 km west of Baghdad, has been under attack from US-led troops for over two weeks as they attempt to root out insurgents based there. The majority of residents fled the city before hostilities began and took refuge in camps in nearby towns or in Baghdad. “We have no house to live in. The city is destroyed. There is no shop where we can pick up food, so how can we pick up this form to vote?” Mohammed’s wife Shatha, 29, asked. “Now there are explosions in Baghdad, too. It’s just not safe.” But attempts are being made by the authorities to provide security for voters. Security for polling stations will be handled by Iraqi police, Adel Alami, chief electoral officer at the election commission, said at a press conference on Sunday. Poll workers will only be responsible for making sure no one carries a gun inside the polling stations. “We have had some discussions about disturbances already and we are following up on this,” Alami said. He said it was too soon to tell if it would be safe enough to open polling stations in places like Ramadi and Fallujah, where insurgents and US troops continue to fight. Voter commissions are being recruited in both cities, just as they are across the country, Alami said. The commission has not made a decision yet about what will happen next in terms of elections in those cities. The commission has certified close to 200 political parties and more than 40 individual candidates to run for office. A media campaign is scheduled to start on 15 December. An estimated 4 million Iraqi exiles would be allowed to vote outside of the country through a campaign starting immediately, Hussain Hindawi, chief of the electoral commission, told reporters at the weekend. In addition, monitoring teams are expected to include the Arab League and the European Union. “We want to be transparent and honest and at the highest level, so we hope there will be the highest participation,” Hindawi said. “Party observer teams will also be a big part of these elections." Senior United Nations envoy to Iraq, Ashraf Qazi, said on 15 November that the organisation would continue to do all it could to help with the process of rebuilding Iraq, adding that he expected to increase the number of UN international staff in Iraq as the elections neared. A small team of 35 electoral experts from the UN has been helping to organise the forthcoming ballot to guarantee there is no malpractice during vote counting. Iraq has been pressing for more UN experts to help prepare for the elections, but the world body has been unable to respond due to insecurity in the country and by the lack of offers to provide troops for a special protection force, especially after the August 2003 bombing of the UN headquarters in Baghdad in which 22 people were killed including top UN envoy to Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello.