Distribution Of Seats In Iraqi

Distribution of Seats in Iraqi Parliament

Al-Hayat [Arabic link] has printed the number of seats won by all the small parties in the Iraqi elections. The total number of seats is 275. What it shows is that the religious Shiites easily have a majority if they pull in a few small parties. I count 6 obvious Shiite seats that could be picked up by the UIA for most votes important to religious Shiites. That would give them 50.5 percent of the vote. They’d just need one or two other independents to win most votes.

AFP is convinced that the UIA may all by itself be given 140 seats, not 133, because of a “complex counting system” to be employed in seating delegates. Andrew Arato writes, “This would be so, because wasted votes for very small parties . . . would have to redivided. Say it is 8%. 48% of that is 4%. Even of 5 half is 2.5% that would put them over.” If this procedure yields an extra percentage to the UIA, and if we add in the religious Shiite tiny parties, the UIA could well have a comfortable majority in the parliament.

United Iraqi Alliance (Shiite): 133 seats
Kurdish Alliance: 71
Iraqiya (Allawi = Secular Shiites) 38
Iraqiyyun (al-Yawir= Sunni Arabs) 5
Turkmen Front of Iraq 3
Cadres and the Chosen (Sadrist Shiites) 3
People’s Union (Communist) 3
Kurdish Islamic Coalition 2
Organization of Islamic Action (Shiite) 2
Democratic National Alliance (Abd Faisal Ahmad) 1
National Mesopotamian List (Christian) 1
Welfare and Liberation Bloc (Mash’an al-Juburi, Sunni) 1
Caucus for Iraqi National Unity (Nahru Muhammad Abdul Karim, Sunni) 1
Independent Democrats (Adnan Pachachi, Sunni) 1
Iraqi Islamic Party (Muhsin Abdul Hamid, Sunni; had withdrawn) 1
Islamic Dawa Movement (splinter of Dawa, headed by Adil Majid) 1
Iraqi National Caucus (Husain Muhammad Abdullah) 1
Constitutional Monarchy Movement (Sharif Ali b. Husain) 1
Royal Iraqi Hashimi Caucus (Sharif Ma’mul al-Naysan) 1
National Democratic Alliance (Malik Duhan al-Hasan) 1
Democratic Iraqi Caucus (Ahmad Jabir Abdullah) 1
National Front for Iraqi Unity 1