NAJAF, Iraq - Iraq’s most influential Shia cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali Al Sistani, has told believers to vote in elections on Dec. 15 and urged them to support religious candidates, his office said on Saturday.
A representative in Sistani’s office said he instructed followers to do three things: turn out to vote on the day; avoid voting for any list whose leader is not religious; and avoid voting for “weak” lists so as not to split the Shia vote. The instructions looked like a coded endorsement of the United Iraqi Alliance, the main Shia list which won the last election in January and dominates the current government.
The United Iraqi Alliance groups Iraq’s two most powerful religious Shia parties -- the pro-Iranian Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, and the Dawa Party, which is headed by Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari. The Alliance was formed for January’s election with the blessing of Sistani. His aides have since criticised the government’s performance and he has distanced himself from party politics, telling his aides not to give explicit endorsements.
But as well as now appearing implicitly to back the Alliance, Sistani’s instructions may also turn Shia voters away from a rival list headed by Allawi, who is secular and has built a coalition of Sunnis, Shias and Kurds. Sistani’s statement may also damage a list headed by Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Chalabi, another secular Shia.
It also encourages voting for the most powerful bloc, rather than smaller parties or lists, a move that is likely to favour the United Iraqi Alliance over smaller Shia Islamist groups.
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