spillmind
Member
Sadistic said:As of 2002, only 40%.
which puts the number of those actually being able to read the ballot they are casting at what?
Follow along with the video below to see how to install our site as a web app on your home screen.
Note: This feature may not be available in some browsers.
Sadistic said:As of 2002, only 40%.
Sir Evil said:C'mon now Spilly, be an optimist about things for once. And the troops can't pull out with all the current insurgency then it will all be for nothing. Things changed in Iraq for the better, you just don't want to believe that yet.
no said:which puts the number of those actually being able to read the ballot they are casting at what?
masochist said:there is going to be a civil war between the sunnis and the shi'ites, and the only thing we can go about it is to split up the countries, or continue to get picked off like they have been ever since the day we started the occupation.
spillmind said:which puts the number of those actually being able to read the ballot they are casting at what?
spillmind said:i'm convinced.
all these things are so great! i was so wrong about a civil war. and i should believe like you do that iraq is going awesome and we can't do a better job.
life is better believing these things anyway
Said1 said:I think the threat of civil war already exsisted, when Saddam was power.
By Liz Sly, Tribune foreign correspondent. Tribune foreign correspondent Evan Osnos and Nadeem Majeed contributed to this report
Published February 3, 2005
BAGHDAD -- The hard-line Sunni religious organization that had called on its followers to boycott Iraq's election said Wednesday that it would "respect the choice" of voters and accept the new government, hinting at the beginnings of an accommodation with the political process.
Amid growing concerns about the ramifications of the apparently low voter turnout in Sunni areas, the Association of Muslim Scholars complained that the elections "lack legitimacy because a large segment of different sects, parties and currents boycotted."
But in an apparent softening of its previously resolute rejection of any institution formed while U.S. troops are occupying Iraq, the association said it would not oppose the elected government. The hard-line clerics, who wield influence in the insurgent-infested Sunni heartland, had refused to recognize what they called the "puppet" government of interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi.
"We are going to respect the choice of those who voted and we will consider the new government--if all the parties participating in the political process agree on it--as a transitional government with limited powers," the association said in a statement.
Evidence is emerging that the low turnout in some Sunni areas can be attributed at least partly to a lack of voting sites and materials rather than a boycott by Sunnis heeding the clerics' call. Several Sunni politicians who competed in the election have complained that ballots ran out or election centers failed to open in several key areas, disenfranchising tens of thousands of voters.
Election officials acknowledged that there had been shortages of voting materials in some locations and blamed the dangers of operating in the Sunni heartland where the insurgency rages.
"The conditions were very severe," said election commission spokesman Farid Ayar.
Christian leaders also said ballots were not available in some Christian villages west of Mosul, denying an estimated 35,000 members of Iraq's small Christian community the opportunity to vote.
"We don't know whether the ballots were kidnapped or whether they never arrived, but the rights of those people were swallowed," said Yonadem Kanna, head of the Assyrian Democratic Movement.
The results of Sunday's historic vote still are being tallied, and officials have not released the nationwide turnout. But all available evidence points to a sharply lower turnout in Sunni areas than Shiite ones.
A Western diplomat who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity said turnout in the unruly western province of Anbar had been "quite low." In two other restive Sunni provinces, Salahuddin and Nineveh, there was more voting but still less than 50 percent participation, the diplomat said.
The turnout nonetheless appears to have exceeded expectations. One reason ballots ran out in some locations was that election organizers had underestimated the number of Sunnis who wanted to vote.
"The total [involved] in the process was unexpected," Ayar said.
In the Baghdad neighborhood of Adhamiyah, a notorious insurgent stronghold where no polling stations opened, some residents voiced regret that they were unable to vote.
"I feel sad because I didn't participate in this first democratic experiment in the country," said Abu Omer al-Dawoudi, 53, a grocery store owner who said he would have voted if there had been a polling station nearby. Although people in Adhamiyah had been told they could vote in the neighboring Cairo district, 3 miles away, al-Dawoudi said he did not dare walk that far under threat of insurgent violence.
Iraqi leaders now are focusing their efforts on ways to include Sunnis in the process. Allawi held a meeting at his offices in the Green Zone that brought together leading officials from all the major political parties, including the head of the Iraqi Islamic Party, another Sunni group that boycotted the election.
Adnan Pachachi, a moderate Sunni leader who attended the meeting, said he believes the Sunnis who called for a boycott are starting to regret their stand.
"I think they realize this was a mistake," Pachachi said. "They have seen the desire of the people who voted ... and they realize they can't go on being sidelined like this."
spillmind said:was there not food at the polling stations?
do the people have any other option in their lives when the world around them is reduced to rubble?
what is the literacy rate in iraq? and how many people could read the ballots without help?
how is this going to bring order to iraq?
and when will the troops pull out, proving that it is a legitimate, stable democracy?
let's be honest about things, jeff.
Influential Sunni Arab leaders of a boycott of last Sunday's elections expressed a new willingness Friday to engage the coming Iraqi government and play a role in writing the constitution, in what may represent a strategic shift in thinking among mainstream anti-occupation groups.