Some Big Election Problems in Iraq

[TexasLawyer]

Some of these problems sound a little familiar.

From Voice of America

http://www.voanews.com/english/2005-02-08-voa72.cfm

Ballot Counting in Iraq Delayed by Complaints By Alisha Ryu
Baghdad
08 February 2005

<snip>

Iraqis went to the polls on January 30 to choose a new 275-member transitional national assembly, as well as council members for each of Iraq's 18 provinces.

Speaking through an interpreter, the electoral commissioner, Izzedine al-Mahmoudi, asked for patience, as officials look into complaints that a large number of Iraqis were unable to vote on election day. "The commission council discussed all these violations and now we're going to take the necessary decisions concerning these violations and we will inform the Iraqi people about the result," he said.

The commission has already acknowledged several major irregularities, concentrated in and around the volatile northern city of Mosul, which has a mix of Sunni Arab, Kurdish, Christian, and Turkmen populations. Following an investigation, the commission says it has determined that more than 15,000 people in the town of Bartala, near Mosul, could not vote because the polling centers remained closed. The commission says the threat of violence by Sunni militants there on election day kept poll workers from reporting for duty.

Commission officials also say that in several other towns in the area, gunmen looted polling stations and stole ballots, depriving people of the chance to vote. But some Iraqi candidates and political parties maintain that the scope and seriousness of the problems in and around Mosul are far greater than what the electoral commission has so far acknowledged.

Yonadam Kanna headed a slate of mostly Assyrian Christian candidates in the elections. He charges, for example, in at least four districts in Mosul, which has a combined population of some 120,000 Christians, election workers did not properly protect and seal ballot boxes.

<snip>

[fooj]

1. Wow! What a coinki-dinki! Maybe Blackwell WAS in Iraq...

[global1]

2. Abu Adken Alblackwell!!!! n/t