KDP and PUK deliberately delay the elections

Written on August 6, 2013 by Editor in KDP, KRG, PUK

By Mufid Abdulla:

In any country the parliament is the house of privilege, but in Kurdistan we have 110 MPs who cannot decide when the election days will be. And we have the case of the council elections that have not being held for the last twelve years. This amounts to a fraudulent attempt by the two ruling parties to sustain their privileges and corruption.

The so-called Independent High Commission for Elections is working very closely in Kurdistan with the KDP leadership as has been the case in the past. Howver, last week the independent committee for observing the voters’ roll published its shocking findings. These revealed that the names of more than 126,000 people who have died have not been removed from the list. Basically this allows the KDP to utilize these names of deceased people for their own electoral advantage.

Various KDP and PUK leaders have issued different statements on the elections but none has, for example, explained why council election have not been held so many years. Sources close to the KDP leadership have (on condition of anonymity) offered me this explanation: “Both the KDP and PUK are not advocating any early parliamentary and local council elections. First, the PUK are lacking leadership and the internal conflict has upset most of the PUK grassroots and, for that reason, the current leadership thinks it needs more time to win the hearts of these ignored members Second, the KDP is having major problems on several fronts. It is obvious to the people of Kurdistan that the KDP in most elections has been the source of ballot rigging. This time it has to work harder because people know about their tactics from the past”.