Maliki orders withdrawal of bloc’s contests against election results

BAGHDAD / IraqiNews.com: Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, the leader of the Dawlat al-Qanoon (State of Law) bloc, gave instructions to withdraw all the contests forwarded by his bloc against the recent Iraqi parliamentary election results, a source close to Maliki said on Tuesday. “Maliki’s instructions to withdraw all the contests submitted to the federal court aim to accelerate the endorsement of the election results,” the source told IraqiNews.com news agency. Hammam Hammoudi, a leading member of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council (SIIC), had appealed to Maliki on Sunday (May 30) to withdraw contests against the legislative elections results in a bid to accelerate the formation of a new Iraqi government. A parliamentary election was held in Iraq on 7 March 2010. The election decided the 325 members of the Council of Representatives who will elect the Iraqi prime minister and president. The election resulted in a partial victory for the Iraqi National Movement (Iraqiya), led by former Interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, which won a total of 91 seats, making it the largest alliance in the Council. The State of Law, led by incumbent Prime Minister Maliki, was the second largest grouping with 89 seats. The election has been controversial. On January 15, 2010 Iraq‘s Independent High Electoral Commission banned 499 candidates from the election due to alleged links with the Ba’ath Party. Before the start of the campaign on 12 February 2010, the IHEC confirmed that the appeals by banned candidates had been rejected and thus all 456 banned candidates would not be allowed to run for the election. A recount of the votes in Baghdad was ordered on 19 April 2010. On May 14, the IHEC announced that after 11,298 ballot boxes had been recounted, there was no sign of fraud or violations. AmR (S) 1