Rigging charges undermine Iraq vote

http://www.deccanherald.com/deccanherald/oct192005/foreign1543220051018.asp

Tampering with the ballot could exacerbate tensions alienating some communities and gaining further recruits for the insurgency.


The credibility of Iraq’s constitutional referendum has been undermined by allegations of vote rigging in as many as 12 of the country’s 18 provinces. While such activity is not of great importance in the 10 provinces where Shias predominate, it is of serious significance in Nineveh and Diyala, two Sunni majority provinces.

In at least one it was expected that no votes would approach the two-thirds level. If that had happened, the constitution would have been rejected because in two other Sunni provinces, Salaheddin and Anbar, two thirds of voters said ‘no’.

Early reporting of the vote in Nineveh, where the largely Sunni city of Mosul is the capital, suggested that 70-80 per cent of voters had rejected the controversial document. Therefore, it was surprising when official results indicated that there was an overwhelming vote in favour.

If proven, tampering with the ballot is certain to exacerbate tension between the ruling Shias and Kurds, on one hand, and the marginalised Sunnis, secularists, Christians and Turkomen, on the other.