Frying Pan to the Fire

Iraq’s murky post-election mess was awfully disturbing—a recent war zone at the center of the world’s most strategically important region was still without a government, two months after a national election. Yesterday, after weeks of wrangling, the two top Shia coalitions—Nuri al-Maliki’s State of Law list and the Iraqi National Alliance (INA)—announced they would join forces. But that’s not much of a relief.

The two groups have a common enemy: Ayad Allawi and his Iraqiya coalition, the top vote getters in the election. According to the Iraqi Constitution, Allawi should get first crack at forming the government. But there’s no way that Allawi, a Shia, can dictate terms to this new mega-coalition of Shia parties. It’s clear that—regardless of an ongoing vote recount—Maliki and the INA intend to muscle Allawi out of the picture. And here’s why that’s problematic: Sunnis voted for Allawi in big numbers. If Allawi isn’t given a role in the new government, they’re going to feel like they got shafted. This will play into their worst fears about Shia domination, the illegitimacy of the political process, and their lack of strong political representation in the new Iraq. It could well precipitate a return to a broad Sunni-supported insurgency against the government.

Still, we’re not quite there yet. For the moment, the announcement of the new coalition clearly shrinks the pool of potential prime-minister candidates. Barring the entry of a dark horse (Maliki was one of those after the 2005 elections), here’s the shortlist:

* Ibrahim Jafari. A mild-mannered Shia, Jafari tried to change his image by striking a tough-guy pose in his campaign posters and speaking out harshly against supposed Baathist conspirators in the lead-up to the elections. But he’s remembered by many Iraqis as an ineffective leader during his brief tenure as prime minister in 2005. His biggest strength: he’s got the support of the powerful Sadrist bloc within the INA.

* Jafar al-Sadr. A relative newcomer to the political scene, Sadr also has a strong shot at the prime-minister post. Even though he’s not well known among ordinary Iraqis, he can get a lot of bounce from his family name. He is the son of Mohammad Baqir Sadr, a revered Shia cleric and thinker who was killed by Saddam Hussein in 1980. He’s also related to Moqtada al-Sadr by marriage. (Moqtada is married to Jafar’s sister.) In an unofficial referendum held by the Sadrists after the elections, Jaafar Sadr came in second, after Jafari.

* Maliki. Although Maliki didn’t get the top vote in the elections, it’s clear that he’s going to fight to keep his post. His biggest obstacle could be the Sadrists. They harbor a deep grudge against Maliki for greenlighting a military campaign against the Shia Mahdi Army in Basra and Baghdad in 2007 and 2008. Those operations also showed that Maliki is a savvy political operator and won him support among many ordinary Iraqis who were fed up with militia violence. He could use that popularity to rally supporters within the new coalition.

Regardless of whom the new coalition chooses as their candidate, the new prime minister will have to work very hard to win the support of the Sunnis. If not, Iraq is headed for a dark place yet again.