Muqtada al-Sadr Strengthens His Parliamentary Position

Muqtada al-Sadr, a Shia cleric and nationalist whose coalition won the most votes in last month's Iraqi parliamentary elections, has solidified his position in the upcoming parliament by forming a new alliance with two other lists. According to Agence France-Presse, this former leader of Shia militias reached an agreement on Thursday, June 7, to form a broader coalition with the Hikma list, led by Ammar al-Hakim, and Iyad Allawi, a secular politician and current Vice President, whose list is primarily composed of Sunnis. This move by Muqtada al-Sadr comes a day after the Iraqi parliament voted to recount votes manually and annul the results of overseas ballots in response to increasing claims of widespread fraud in last month's voting, and also dissolved the electoral commission. The strengthened coalition of Muqtada al-Sadr will give him and his allies about 100 parliamentary seats, but it will still not be enough to achieve a majority in Iraq's parliament, which has 329 seats. The Iraqi political system is designed to prevent the dominance of a single individual or party over power, which usually leads to a lengthy bargaining process among various parties and groups after each election. Currently, the issue of vote recounting has not disrupted these negotiations. The strengthened coalition of Muqtada al-Sadr is calling for economic reforms and decentralization while stating that it opposes the politicization of government affairs and military institutions. Within the current political framework, Iran-backed Shia militias will still be able to neutralize Muqtada al-Sadr's efforts, which seek greater independence for Iraq from the US and Iran. When the preliminary results of last month's parliamentary elections were announced, Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force, came to Baghdad to unite Shia groups against Muqtada al-Sadr. Qassem Soleimani met with Haider al-Abadi, the current Prime Minister whose list won 42 seats, leaders of the Popular Mobilization Forces (Hashd al-Shaabi) who secured 47 seats, and Nouri al-Maliki, the former Prime Minister who won 26 seats. If these groups unite, they would collectively secure 115 seats, which is sufficient to form a government according to the Iraqi constitution. Meanwhile, the Iraqi Supreme Judicial Council announced that 'practical preparations' for the manual recount of votes have begun at the electoral commission's headquarters. All members of the dissolved electoral commission and Iraqi officials have reported that some of them may face legal action for fraud. The electoral commission has also announced that it will file a complaint in protest against the dissolution of this body.