Sunni alliance: holding Iraqi elections as scheduled is “military coup”
Iraqi parliament.
Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) Holding Iraq’s parliament and local elections as scheduled will represent a “military coup, Iraq’s largest Sunni alliance said as the government pushes forward with the first election after the defeat of Islamic State militants.
Raad al-Dahlaki, a senior member of the Alliance of Iraqi Forces, told Baghdad Today that “holding the elections under the current circumstances will represent a military coup against the political process by allowing the ascension of military commanders to assume the government’s political helm”.
According to Dahlaki, the Iraqi government has not fulfilled the requirements for holding fair elections including “the return of refugees and limiting weapons to the state’s hands”.
He added that those “were the most important points for which the parliament had voted for holding the elections…until now, neither has been applied”.
Iraq slated legislative and local elections for May 12th, but many Sunni politicians have questioned the integrity of the anticipated polls as nearly half of displaced civilians have yet to be repatriated to their home areas retaken from Islamic State militants.
The war against IShad displaced nearly five million people since the emergence of the group in 2014.
Sunni politicians have also been disturbed by Shia paramilitary commanders who dropped arms to run the elections.