Harb describes IHEC as Not independent

Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) The Legal Expert, Tariq Harb, described the Independent High Electoral Commission as being “Not independent due to setting the law drafts of the elections.”

In a press statement received by IraqiNews.com on Monday, he said “The statements of one of the members of the IHEC over setting the law drafts of the elections by IHEC and sending it to the parliament for endorsement violates the IHEC’s law No. 11 in 2007, which tasks IHEC with conducting and supervising elections rather than drafting its law.”

“This indicates that there are non Iraqi sides interfere in this issue such as the United Nations,” he added, noting that “The Egyptian judicial system conducted the parliamentary elections, constitution voting and the presidential elections in six months only without presence of IHEC in Egypt, whereas the IHEC requests six months and huge amounts of money to conduct the elections.”

“The last elections done by the IHEC were the parliament elections two years ago and the IHEC did not do any activities except paying salaries to its employees,” he concluded.

Earlier, the head of the Independent High Electoral Commission, Faraj al-Haidari, stated that the local elections will not be conducted on time.

Speaking to Iraqi News (IraqiNews.com), he said “There is no law to organize the local elections in addition to the lack of money to cover this process.”