United Nations Radio

With most of the votes counted from the March 7th parliamentary election in Iraq, preliminary results are likely to be announced in the coming days. The Secretary-General's top envoy in Iraq, Ad Melkert, told UN Radio's Reem Abaza that the entire process has been was an historic one, with complaints of fraud at a minimum.

fingers dipped in ink

MELKERT: Well, there are complaints in every election, and they will be dealt with, and are being dealt with, in the official complaint procedure that was part of the whole setup so I cannot anticipate the outcome of that in every detail. However, it seems that widespread fraud has not been found or where there was some indications of efforts, they have been caught in the process, so to speak. So it means that we expect that the outcome of these elections will very much represent the will of the voters and be acceptable to Iraq and the world as a strong basis for parliament and government in the next four years.

ABAZA: How do you evaluate the whole process until now?

MELKERT: Well, you know it has been very interesting and fascinating process because, let's not forget, we're talking here about only the second parliamentary elections for the full tenure of a parliament and actually the first time that the Iraqis themselves were in the lead from beginning till the end because four years ago, the scene was of course still very much dominated by the US presence. Now, it has been their process starting with a long but very productive discussion and decision in parliament in November and December last year. It made the start of the elections quite late, so the time for preparation was tight yet in that limited time framework, mountains have been moved by the Iraqis but also with strong support of the UN. And, overall, the process has led to a system in place that really enabled the Iraqis to have confidence that their vote would count. All along there have also been issues, political issues also particularly with regards to the exclusion of a number of candidates due to the law that prevents people that held certain positions under the old Saddam regime to stand for public office. That process has had its downside, particularly the transparency was not as it should have been, but it was based on a law that has been adopted by Iraqi parliament. And by and large, that has not affected the overall process, including the number of candidates that stood for office- more than 6,000-and the number of voters that participated in the vote, around 12 million, has truly become a very historic process.

ABAZA: Back to some of the complaints that have arisen recently. Do you think that this would affect in any way the political process after announcing the results? I mean forming the coalition and so on?

MELKERT: It's not in every way possible for me to answer that. I mean, with collecting complaints, it is always necessary to distinguish between relatively isolated complaints that go back to the handling of the voter in one or the other voting stations, or more systematic features of problems in the system. It is at this point not likely that such systematic complaints will occur in the complaints that have been filed and in that sense, I don't think it's very likely that that part of the process will affect the aftermath. And indeed we see already that the political parties are basically preparing themselves now to talk to each other, to consider their options, and to prepare for the government formation process.

ABAZA: After the end of this process, what's the main challenge you will be working on in the next stage?

MELKERT: Yes. There are still quite a few things there. Of course, a smooth transition towards a new government-and a new government that really takes up the big social and economic policy challenges of Iraq-is of high importance. And many of the UN agencies, funds and programmes are actively engaged in supporting the Iraqi government in that transition and also at the start of a new period with the implementation of the national development plan. Then there is still a political agenda out there of high significance for the future stability of the country, particularly the relations between Arabs and Kurds in view of disputed boundaries between the Kurdistan Region and the Federal State of Iraq will require a lot of attention that is also relevant for agreements on the sharing of oil production revenues. That's highly politically charged, and the UN could possibly play a role there in facilitating conversation, negotiations, mutual approach and understanding.

PRES: Ad Melkert is the Special Representative of the Secretary-General in Iraq.

Producer:  Diane Bailey
Duration: 4'05"