BAGHDAD, 22 February 2005 — Members of the Shiite political group that emerged as the power broker after last month’s elections haggled yesterday over who to nominate for the top job in Iraq’s new government.
Meeting in central Baghdad, groups represented in the United Iraqi Alliance failed to whittle down their candidates for prime minister from two to one. Instead, they had to deal with the emergence of a third candidate.
To deal with the problem, representatives of the Islamic Dawa Party, the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, the Iraqi National Congress and several other political parties formed a 21-member selection committee to decide on just two nominees.
Those two candidates will then face a secret ballot among the 140 members of the Alliance elected to the 275-member National Assembly in the Jan. 30 elections. That ballot will probably take place today.
The talks resumed yesterday after a break for the Ashura.
Several people were killed in a series of attacks in Iraq yesterday, including US soldiers and a senior police officer, Lt. Col. Essam Fathi. Three US soldiers were killed and eight wounded in a bomb attack.
Two Indonesian journalists kidnapped by the insurgents were freed yesterday.
Indonesian reporter Meutya Hafid and cameraman Budiyanto were released in Ramadi. A previously unknown group, the Army of Islamic Warriors, said it freed the pair after confirming their identity, and that it offered “its apologies to the Indonesian people,” according to a statement reported by Al-Arabiya television.
Meanwhile, Ibrahim Jaafari, Iraqi vice president and leader of Iraq’s oldest Shiite party, Dawa, is widely expected to get the job, while secular politician and erstwhile Pentagon favorite Ahmed Chalabi is seen as an outside candidate.
In another development, Interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi put in a bid to retain his job yesterday when his coalition, which came third in the Jan. 30 election, formally nominated him as a candidate for premier.
“Allawi is the coalition’s candidate to be the next prime minister,” Thaer Al-Naqib, a government spokesman, told Reuters. “There are several other parties that support his bid for the prime ministership,” he added. Allawi’s entrance into the fray now means there will be competition for Iraq’s most-powerful political position. It also suggests Allawi’s backers believe not everyone is content to allow the United Iraqi Alliance to decide unopposed who gets the job.
