Alwaght- Influenced by post-election conditions, the Iraqi political atmosphere has been revolving around government formation, with the debate going nowhere and clouds of difference shadowing the negotiations of the political groups on the coalition government structure.
While distance of views exists on a series of cases among the political parties and leaders, the key sticking point is the post of prime minister. Among the prominent figures for the post is the current Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi whose term has ended. The speculations about him retaining the post increased after he last week met Muqtada al-Sadr, the Shiite cleric with biggest number of parliamentary seats.
Although al-Kadhimi's political background is almost certain, and he is a liberal figure, he did not nominate a specific party for the parliamentary election, and now like 2020 his stay in or exit from the Iraqi politics is largely tied to him lobbying to get the political parties' favor. Meanwhile, the challenges ahead of his stay in power are not a few.
Al-Sadr-Al-Kadhimi view adaptation challenge
One of the most important challenges the PM candidates face before they get approval is the green light from Sadrist Movement leader Muqtada al-Sadr as the main winner of the elections. Naturally, al-Sadr looks for one whose political past is not marred by political corruption and incompetence and secondly has the highest conformity to his views concerning governance. Now, the big challenge is that al-Sadr's past bears witness to his sudden shifts in political views in line with the conditions and this is an obstacle ahead of reelection of a person who over the past two years revealed much of his foreign and home policy as well as economic approach. Al-Sadr, for example, has been a staunch opponent of the continued presence of foreign occupying forces on Iraqi soil, and has always demanded this from previous governments. For many Iraqis, he is a symbol of resistance to foreign occupation. However, it is also clear that the al-Kadhimi government's performance in enforcing a parliamentary resolution to expel foreign troops by the end of 2021 has been highly questionable and even compromising.
It should also not be forgotten that although the most obvious form of marriage of approaches of al-Sadr and al-Kadhimi is the confrontation of militias outside the control of the government, it should be borne in mind that al-Sadr considers himself the spiritual leader of Iraqi resistance groups. He supported arming of various militants, including Saraya Al-Salam and before that Mahdi Army, while al-Kadhimi is a staunch opponent of these militias and this can prove challenging in the future.
Serious opponents of al-Kadhimi
Another challenge al-Kadhimi faces in his way to retaining the PM post is the opposition to him by the Shiite Coordination Framework (SCF). One of the main differences between Shiite groups and al-Kadhimi is his performance concerning expulsion of the foreign occupation forces and pursuit of the case of assassination of Iran's General Qassem Soleimani and Iraq's Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis at Baghdad International Airport in early 2020. During the protests at the election results, al-Kadhimi ordered a crackdown on the peaceful gatherings, arousing the ire of these groups.
Following the announcement of the election results, the groups expressed their opposition to any re-election of al-Kadhimi. A source told Shafaq news that the SCF representative told al-Sadr coalition that the all-Shiite bloc was totally against al-Kadhimi remaining in power.
"Al-Kadhimi's period ended and he cannot dream of another term," Al-Malouma news quoted Member of Parliament from State of Law Mahmoud al-Salami as saying.
So, with such firm opposition, al-Sadr is aware that his insistence on al-Kadhimi premiership continuation would cause challenges both to formation of national majority government and the PM power to patch things up.
Protest crisis and al-Kadhimi's economic performance record
Another challenge ahead of al-Kadhimivs stay is his performance record over the past two years. Al-Sadr enthusiastically advocates improving the living conditions and fighting corruption and foreign influence. These al-Sadr slogans come as during al-Kadhimi premiership, demonstrations at deteriorating economic conditions continued. Therefore, if he supports another term for al-Kadhimi, he has to back his two-year performance record and this considerably impairs the influencing power of his reformist slogans in public opinion.
