Iraqi forces, displaced people vote early ahead of election
BAGHDAD
Iraqis are preparing to vote in a parliamentary election that comes at a crucial moment in the country and the region, with members of Iraq’s security forces and its internally population on Nov. 9 heading to the polls for early voting.
Polls opened early on Nov. 9 for members of the armed forces, who account for 1.3 million of the more than 21 million eligible voters and would be deployed for security purposes on election day,.
More than 26,500 internally displaced people were also eligible for early voting.
The general election is set for Nov. 11, while the outcome of the vote will influence whether Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani can serve a second term.
While Iraq has seen relative stability during Sudani's first term, he does not have an easy path to a second one. Only one Iraqi prime minister has served more than one term since 2003.
On one side, Sudani faces disagreements with some leaders in the Shiite Coordination Framework bloc that brought him to power over control of state institutions. On the other side, he faces increasing pressure from the U.S. to control the country's militias.
The Nov. 11 elections will be the sixth since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq that toppled Sunni dictator Saddam Hussein.
More than 7,740 candidates, nearly a third of them women, are running for the 329-seat parliament.
An old electoral law, which parliament revived in 2023, will apply to the elections, with many seeing it as favoring larger parties.
While around 70 independents won seats in the 2021 election, only 75 independents are contesting in the upcoming ballot.
Observers fear that turnout might dip below the 41-percent record low of 2021, reflecting voters' apathy and skepticism in a country marked by entrenched leadership, mismanagement and endemic corruption.
Influential Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr has urged his followers to boycott what he described as a "flawed election.”
Since the US-led invasion, Iraq's once-oppressed Shiite majority has dominated politics.
