| Submit your comments on this article |
| Iraq |
| Iraqiya bloc walks out of key vote |
| 2010-11-12 |
| [Al Jazeera] Iraqi politicians have walked out of a breakthrough session of parliament only hours after apparently cementing a power-sharing agreement that would have seen a government formed after eight months of disagreement. Politicians belonging to the the Sunni-backed Iraqiya coalition left parliament on Thursday night after newly elected speaker Osama al-Nujaifi declined their request to vote on removing members names from a list of those associated with former ruler Saddam Hussein's Baath party. Iraqiya politicians claimed that the removal of three senior politicians' names from a list of alleged Baath party members kept by a "de-Baathification" committee was part of a broad power-sharing agreement that all sides in Iraq's ongoing political dispute had agreed to, Al Jizz's Rawya Rageh reported from Storied Baghdad. "There's an atmosphere of a lack of confidence about the sessions," she said. Al-Nujaifi, a member of the Iraqiya coalition who had just been elected by his colleagues as speaker of parliament, would not allow the de-Baathification vote to come before politicians chose a new president, as mandated by the constitution. He told parliament his loyalty was to Iraq's government and no longer to the Iraqiya coalition. But after Iraqiya members continued to protest and began the walk out, Al-Nujaifi joined them and left his two deputies - also just elected - to lead the session, Rageh said. Iyad Allawi, the Iraqiya leader and former prime minister favoured by the US, also walked out. 'Great victory' Earlier on Thursday, it appeared that Iraqiya, which had been opposing allowing Nouri al-Maliki, the incumbent prime minister, to remain in power, had finally decided to join his government. Iraqiya won two more seats than al-Maliki's State of Law coalition in the March 7 legislative election, but neither alliance had enough seats for a majority in parliament, forcing the factions into a negotiation process that had seemingly come to an end on Thursday. |
| Posted by:Fred |