NYT: Shiite Faction Ready to Shun Sunday's Election in Iraq

[WCGreen]

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Jan. 28 Less than 48 hours before nationwide elections here, Nasir al-Saedy, one of the city's most popular Shiite clerics, stood before a crowd of 20,000 Iraqis and uttered not a single word about the vote.

Sheik Saedy spoke of faith, humility and the power of God. But about Sunday's elections, the first here in more than 30 years, nothing.

For the throngs of Iraqis who had come to Al Mohsen Mosque to listen, the sheik's silence came through loud and clear.

On Edit, forgot the Link...
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/29/international/middleeast/29iraq.html?hp&ex=1107061200&en=af3334ab192c7aa6&ei=5094&partner=homepage


The article goes on to point out that al-Sadir, who everyone remembers as that darn oh so radical Shiite cleric, has been playing both sides against the middle. In one breath the dashing, yet stern faced leader of a "vast" number of Iraqi Shiites, calls for a boycott of the election through his overwhelming silence on the subject. But quietly, the semi-outlaw cleric, has fielded a small slate of candidates.

Go figure. one thing Iraq has in common with the US is a cadre of two faced double talking "religious" folk who will say just about anything to get their slice f the pie......

Stayed tuned for a less than stellar election turn out....

Or maybe not. Perhaps the Bushies in charge of the propaganda machine that this administration has become, is setting the stage for a surprise larger than expected turnout in the election just hours away from commencing.//

Can it get any more exciting than this????? My, oh my......

[oasis]

1. I get the feeling that those ungrateful bastards would rather make Bush

look bad than vote. :mad:

[rooboy]

2. Yeah, they're SOOOO ungrateful. n/t

[Zhade]

9. Ungrateful bastards?

When the fuck did they ASK the United States to invade THEIR country?

[delhurgo]

3. If a Shiite-head cleric is upset about the election, I'd say

thats a good sign. Maybe he knows that the religious nuts over there won't have power. I thought maybe that they would be the ones that would benefit because all the Islamists would come out to vote and vote in a bunch of religious conservatives.

We like to talk up democracy, but without a Bill of Rights majority rule can be a very repressive form of government - if the majority is made up of an uneducated, very religious majority. I think I may even rather live under a dictatorship, as long as he was benevolent and had at least some belief in civil liberties.

[WCGreen]

4. I believe the idea of invading a country to bring

democracy is perhaps the most absurdest notion I have ever hear....

It's as if a Dali painting has come alive......

[LynnTheDem]

7. Isn't it tho.

Nation minding its own business, not doing anythign to anyone.

Invade nation, occupy nation, kill 40,000-100,000 civilians...and call it "spreading democracy".

What's "democratic" about an invasion? Occupation? And evn funnier is the fact that the invading occupiers went against the majority of their own citizens to invade & occupy a nation that never wanted to be invaded & occupied.

This one really needs to go down as the #1 Most Absured Ever in human history.

[aikido15]

8. I agree...

Democracy at gunpoint...brilliant!:eyes:

[TahitiNut]

13. Forcing 'democracy' on a nation at gunpoint ...

... is the moral equivalent of forcing 'love' on a woman at gunpoint.


It's rape.

[shadowknows69]

10. yeah the one with all the staircases that lead to nowhere n/t

[TahitiNut]

12. "Democracy" would be a referendum ...

(1) Yankee Go Home
(2) Welcome to Iraq


Go ahead, citizens of Iraq, vote!

What they're doing now is mere stage dressing for a fraud.

[Carni]

17. Which is exactly why they put up with Saddam for 40 years

Saddam was bad...but my understanding is that the minority in the country (that was in power) viewed living under an Islamic state as worse.

Murdering tyrant, or otherwise, Saddam kept the fundamentalists at bay.

The bush admin has a real mess on their hands because this is a no win both for the more moderate people of Iraq and the United States.

[LynnTheDem]

5. Gee...it isn't just the deadender Sunnis. heh. If we had a media we'd

already know this. Like the rest of the world.

Contrary to many Western press reports which depicted the debate over the election date as polarising Iraq along sectarian lines -- with the majority of Shia pro-election, while the Sunnis are pro-delay -- Iraqi political activist Mussa Al-Husseini (Shia) told the Weekly that there were also large sections of the Shia population who are committed to boycotting the elections.

Al-Husseini, who describes himself as a secular Shia, went on to point out that there are large numbers of Iraqi Shia who will boycott the elections despite Sistani's calls to go to the polls, because they believe that the whole process is merely a charade intended to bestow legitimacy on an illegitimate order.

"The real issue is not about a Sunni boycott versus Shia participation," Al- Husseini insisted. "It is about whether you are against the occupation and support the national resistance. And there are as many Shia as there are Sunnis in that camp."

http://why-war.com/news/2004/12/02/tovoteor.html

"This is a statement issued and signed by 69 independent political groups, religious authorities ( marjyia ), tribal leaders and independent public figures," Mothana Hareth Al-Dari, spokesman for the influential Sunni Muslim Cleric's Association (MCA) said. The statement advocated an "absolute boycott" of the elections. No vote, it continued, "promoted by the occupation forces" can result in sovereignty and independence for the Iraqi people. It cited "vicious" attacks by the occupation on Iraqi cities like Najaf, Karbalaa, Samara, Mosul, Baghdad and "especially the genocidal war launched on Falluja", as among the reasons for boycotting the elections. "The undersigned realise that...the results of the vote have already been decided in favour of those supporting the occupation."

The signatories include Sunni, Shia, Christian, Turkman, Kurdish, Islamic and secular groups.

A Shia electoral list was announced last week, with the blessing of Iraq's senior Shia cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani. Significantly, it did not include supporters of Al-Sadr. The 275 candidate list is expected to dominate the Iraqi parliament and has created the false impression that the boycott is essentially Sunni, while Iraq's Shia are happy to contest the vote.

"You must realise," cautioned Al-Ali, "that there is a big difference between a Shia list and the Shia list. Yes, there is an electoral list, but it doesn't represent all the Shia. Don't forget that the Al-Sadrist movement is influential in the Iraqi street and it is boycotting the elections." The elections' opponents, he stressed, include both Sunni and Shia.

"I speak now as a Shia," he told the Weekly, "and what they are doing is dividing the nationalist line. We will not hesitate to expose those who do that."

And, according to the MCA's Al-Dhari, "one quarter of the election boycott front is Shia."

http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2004/721/re7.htm

bushCartel & the US StateMedia caught out in deception yet again.

[Carni]

19. This is interesting

I didn't realize there were secular Shia factions.

[aikido15]

6. Vote and die!

Or don't vote and US troops will kill you...either way the Iraqi people lose.

Bush's democracy and freedom...what a fucking sad ass joke.

I feel so sorry for the Iraqi people.:cry:

[Tsiyu]

11. Raw Wounds Behind Shi'ite Drive for Power in Iraq

By Khaled Yacoub Oweis

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Driven by historical grievances, Iraq's majority Shi'ites see Sunday's election as their path to power in the land where Shi'ism was born 13 centuries ago.
From Basra to Baghdad via the shrines of Najaf and Kerbala, Shi'ites feel they are about to gain their birthright after centuries marked by martyrdom, rebellion and yearning -- and decades of persecution by toppled dictator Saddam Hussein.

Guided by Iraq's top Shi'ite cleric, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, many Shi'ite leaders say they seek only a fair share of power for their long-oppressed community, not the exclusion of the traditionally dominant Sunni Arab minority.

Since the U.S.-led invasion, Sistani has advocated ballots, not bullets, as the best way to promote Shi'ite interests.

Sunday's election is the fruit of his insistence that former U.S. administrator Paul Bremer reverse his original plan, which envisaged elections only after a constitution had been written.

More:

http://wireservice.wired.com/wired/story.asp?section=Breaking&storyId=982620

[Rockerdem]

14. As usual, Reuters has it right

The Shiites have been waiting for this. They have been slowplaying their way to power, but it is about to happen. And then the blood is really going to flow.

[Carni]

15. But but according to Bush those are the people who want *freedom*

What did this moron admin THINK would happen?

Let's see the Sunni's are pissed because they were ousted from power and would prefer not to live in an Islamic state and the Shiite factions are pretty much loyal to Iran's power structure.

Oh yeah and next the bushites want to invade Iran (go figure)

Have any of these fools even bothered to research any of these various groups (or the history of Iraq for that matter?)

300 billion and God only knows how many killed for WHAT?

[greyXstar]

16. I wouldn't risk my life to vote either..

By forcing this sham of an 'election' to go on, we're just sending more innocents to slaughter. And once again, everyone around the world sees this except Americans.

[lowreed]

18. If the Bu$h administration really want Iraqis ...

to have their own say it should have put
Saddam on the ballot also.

[w4rma]

20. I believe there are like 7,000 people on the ballot.

So he's probably somewhere on there.