Iraqi Parliament Elects Jalal Talabani as President (Update2)

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

April 6 (Bloomberg) -- Iraq's National Assembly today named Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani as the country's first democratically elected president in more than 50 years, breaking a two-month deadlock on forming a new government.

The appointment resolves differences over sharing power between the United Iraqi Alliance, which won the most seats in the Jan. 30 election, and the second-placed Kurdish Alliance. Shiite Interim Finance Minister Adel Abdel Mahdi and former Sunni Vice-President Sheik Ghazi al-Yawar were chosen as Talabani's two deputies.

``This is the new Iraq where no sect or minority controls the whole country and where all the people are unified,'' Speaker of the House and Interim Industry Minister Hajem al-Hassani said in a live broadcast of the session aired by al-Jazeera television.

Members of the 275-seat Assembly gathered inside a temporary parliament building in Baghdad's fortified Green Zone and sat in silence as ballots were counted. The trio got 227 votes and there were 30 empty ballots, al-Hassani said. They'll take their posts in an official ceremony in the capital tomorrow, he added.
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http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000087&sid=aclUrD5MPIZc&refer=top_world_news

[leftchick]

1. His photo.... I am sure he is just another US puppet.....

Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani speaks to reporters after being elected by the National Assembly in Baghdad April 6, 2005. Iraq's parliament named Talabani as its new interim president on Wednesday after weeks of haggling in a major step toward forming a new government more than two months after historic elections. REUTERS/Ceerwan Aziz

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

3. Looks like he just won the Trifecta....

[leftchick]

7. I think he did....

he is going to need an awful lot of those highly paid US mercenaries though.

[Jack Rabbit]

8. That's not terribly important

The presidency is a ceremonial position; the principal task of the president will be to dissolve parliament at the request of the PM and ask the leader of the party with the most seats in parliament to form a new government.

The new PM will be Ibrahim Jaafari. He represents a faction that wants a timetable for the withdrawal of foreign troops and a rollback of a number of Paul Bremer's colonial decrees. The United Iraqi Alliance wants Iraqi resources to be controlled by Iraqis for the benefit of Iraqis. That, of course, is not what Bush bargained for when he lied his way into this quagmire.

Bremer bequeathed to the Iraqis an arrangement that made it very difficult for them to govern themselves. That was almost certainly the idea. The difficulty the new parliament has had thus far have been a result of Bremer's imposition of supermajorities to choose key posts. It would appear that the American puppets have been spent the last several weeks trying to connive their way into positions of influence in spite of being repudiated at the polls in January. Those schemes didn't work; it appears that, in spite of the neocons efforts, an Iraqi nationalist government will take control.

We cannot be completely pleased with the UIA's program. It is an Islamic republican program, not a democratic one. However, Allawi's Iraqi List didn't offer democracy to the Iraqis, either; he offered submission to colonial occupation. The UIA may not have been the best thing imaginable for the Iraqi people, but it was the best thing available. Those who voted in the Iraq's January elections knew this and gave the nationalists 48% of the vote and the colonial puppets 14%.

The UIA has a mandate to from those who voted to take control of Iraq away from the foreigners who invaded two years ago. We will now see if the new Iraqi government confronts the neocons and, if so, how the neocons respond.

[leftchick]

9. Do you have a link for that Jack....

I would like to see an article about Ibrahim Jaafari's position. I seem to remember it going back and forth over US occupation. Perhaps I am probably confusing him with someone else.

I agree that so far the US has not gotten its way with Bremer's edicts. What is happening Politically in Iraq so far is for sure the lesser of two evils.

[BeFree]

11. Underestimated

The whole Iraq situation has been underestimated by the neocons. They don't quite seem to grasp the idea that Iraqi society has seen it all, and will go it's on course no matter what furrners say or do.

I so look forward to the day the head of Iraq asks the U.S. to leave. It will happen.

[Jack Rabbit]

13. Jaafari served as Vice President in the interim government

EDITED for typing

This is the BBC profile of Jaafari, updated today.

As for the program of the UIA, I refer you this piece by Naomi Klein, written to counter all the chortling we heard from the Bushies in early February about the "success" of the Iraqi elections:

The election results are in: Iraqis voted overwhelmingly to throw out the US-installed government of Iyad Allawi, who refused to ask the United States to leave. A decisive majority voted for the United Iraqi Alliance; the second plank in the UIA platform calls for "a timetable for the withdrawal of the multinational forces from Iraq."

There are more single-digit messages embedded in the winning coalition's platform. Some highlights: "Adopting a social security system under which the state guarantees a job for every fit Iraqi...and offers facilities to citizens to build homes." The UIA also pledges "to write off Iraq's debts, cancel reparations and use the oil wealth for economic development projects." In short, Iraqis voted to repudiate the radical free-market policies imposed by former chief US envoy Paul Bremer and locked in by a recent agreement with the International Monetary Fund.

[leftchick]

14. Thank you Jack!

I love Naomi...

:hi:

[Roland99]

10. Iraqis have had strong nationalist sentiments for over a century

The Propagandist and the neocons neglected to do their research before breaking and entering.

[MADem]

15. You're wrong on that score

Talabani is an interesting guy, he has MASSIVE cred in the Kurdish National Movement--he was head of the PUK. I have no doubt that he is doing what the Kurds have always done for decades with good reason, telling people what they want to hear to advance their own agenda. They play the "enemy of my enemy is my friend" game better than any other ethnic group in all of the middle eastern/southwest asian region. But make no mistake--NOT a puppet. A tough fucker who can play hardball when he needs to.

I find it interesting that he's dumped the traditional garb--playing it smart, appealing to the international community as a moderate, a Santa Clausy, pleasant kinda guy. But he's been forged in the crucible of Kurdish nationalism. He has incredibly good instincts--don't sell him short.

This is gonna piss the Turks off, big time. They have issues with this dude, and they have one of the largest standing armies in the world. I'm looking way, way, WAAAAY down the the road to the future, and Iraq may need to worry one day about their oil-poor neighbor to the north. Talabani has repeatedly said that he has no designs on eastern Turkey, where there are a shitload of Kurds, but the Turks have, over the years, been compelled to keep bitching at him about the dangers of inciting insurgency in that end of the country--and in my opinion, they've got cause to be concerned.

[Jack Rabbit]

17. I think you're right about that

However, any power Talabani wields will be rooted in this credibility as leader of the PUK, not as President of Iraq. As President, he has little more power than a constitutional monarch in Europe.

The Kurdish question for Iraq is whether the Kurds will remain in an Iraqi federation as an autonomous region or whether they will opt for outright independence (now that really would piss off the Turks).

Right now, Talabani favors autonomy within a federated Iraq. However, a separate question put to Kurdish voters in January was whether Kurdistan should remain within Iraq or declare independence. Most Kurds favored independence.

A troubling point about the January elections that has not been discussed on this thread is that the Sunnis didn't vote. They fear living in an Iraq dominated by Shia, whom Sunni leaders like Saddam oppressed. If the situation degenerates into a civil war between Sunnis and Shia, the Kurds might take the opportunity to declare independence. That would make more sense than taking sides in a struggle that otherwise doesn't involve them.

[leftchick]

19. thank you for that information....

between what I have learned this AM from you and Jack Rabbit it looks like the neo-cons plans are melting away. All that was predicted to happen before the invasion has come to pass. Too bad they don't realize it is a loser and bring the soldiers home.

:(

[AlCzervik]

16. The ironically named Talabani

[MADem]

18. Taleb, talab, talib...means student if I remember right

The Taliban took a word and made it something else, in a land that was not theirs. He had the name first!

[truthisfreedom]

2. err... don't fly in any... err... don't drive in any... err... don't hang

out in Iraq, sir, and good luck to you.

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

5. Good Question.

Welcome to DU, De_Niro!

[Name removed]

6. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Jack Rabbit]

12. You mean how do we know the Iraqis elected Talabani?

They didn't. Everybody knows that. The president is chosen by Parliament, which was elected by the Iraqis who voted in January.

The victory of a slate of candidates who want a timetable for the withdrawal of foreign troops and a rollback of a number of Bremer's decrees couldn't have pleased the Bushies, so we can assume that it was the choice of the people. Of course, the United Iraqi Alliance defeated Allawi's Iraqi List in non-Kurdish regions by a 3:1 ratio. The election was beyond fixing, even for the Bushies. Instead, the Bushies have been relying on a poorly designed transitional constitution, the work of Mr. Bremer, to make it difficult for the Iraqis to govern themselves.