A final week to resolve the name of the President of the Republic, and the door of understandings be

[size=52]A final week to resolve the name of the President of the Republic, and the door of understandings between the Kurds has not been closed[/size]

[size=45]Baghdad / Tamim Al-Hassan[/size]
[size=45]A crucial week for the Kurdish forces to agree on a final candidate for the presidency, as Parliament announced that the presidential election session will take place at the beginning of next February. Until the moment, the two major Kurdish parties, the Democratic Party and the Union, are sticking to their candidates, but the door to understandings between the two parties is still open.[/size]
[size=45]Now there are 26 candidates running for the position, including well-known Kurdish and Arab figures, one of whom is close to the crowd.[/size]
[size=45]It is interesting that the daughter of a former president of the republic who did not prove his worth, ran for the post. A young man in Erbil also applied for candidacy after previous unsuccessful attempts in the region to obtain leadership positions.[/size]
[size=45]And Parliament confirmed last Saturday that the vote on the presidential candidate will be officially held during the second session of the fifth parliamentary session on Monday, February 7, 2022 next week.[/size]
[size=45]The elected Speaker of Parliament, Muhammad al-Halbousi, had opened, in the first session of the parliament, the door for candidacy for the position of President of the Republic.[/size]
[size=45]door of understandings[/size]
[size=45]Well-informed political sources indicate that there is a "patience" on the part of the Kurdish forces in launching "firm positions" regarding the understanding about the candidate for the president of the republic.[/size]
[size=45]The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan has recently confirmed that its only candidate is the current President of the Republic, Barham Salih, while the Democratic Party supports Hoshyar Zebari, the former Minister of Foreign Affairs and Finance.[/size]
[size=45]However, the sources, who spoke to (Al-Mada) on condition of anonymity confirmed that "the door of understandings has not been closed so far, and there is hope for changes in the next few days."[/size]
[size=45]The two major Kurdish parties accuse each other of jumping on the agreements concluded in the past years between the two parties.[/size]
[size=45]Escalation positions[/size]
[size=45]Abdul Salam Barwari, a leader in the Kurdistan Democratic Party, confirmed that the issue depends on the position of the Patriotic Union, which seems "non-negotiable" so far.[/size]
[size=45]Berwari told Al-Mada that his party "believes that the position of the president of the republic belongs to the Kurdish component and not to a specific party, and this requires understanding between the Kurdish forces about one candidate."[/size]
[size=45]The Democrat indicates that the Union Party has recently taken escalatory positions, despite the existence of joint committees between the two parties.[/size]
[size=45]Berwari continues: "The National Union decided to leave the first session of Parliament without consulting with us, as it singled out Barham Salih as a sole candidate for the presidency, which is also outside the understandings."[/size]
[size=45]The Democrat, according to Berwari, had agreed with the Union not to repeat “the farce of previous years’ sessions in Parliament and to transform the first parliament session into an open one, and therefore he did not leave the session.”[/size]
[size=45]internal crisis[/size]
[size=45]The agreement between the two parties dates back to 2007, when they agreed that the position of the regional head of the Democratic Party and the presidency of the Republic would be for the Union.[/size]
[size=45]But Berwari, a former deputy in the Kurdistan region, says, “In 2014, the leaders of the Union announced the dissolution of this agreement, and in 2018 I submitted a candidate for the presidency (who is Barham Salih) without agreeing with us.”[/size]
[size=45]But the leader of the Democratic Party says that “the 2018 scenario will not be repeated because the Union now has a minority and the Democratic Party has at least 200 allies in Parliament.”[/size]
[size=45]The Democratic Party has 31 seats compared to 17 seats for the Union, while the latter announced a few days ago that "Barham Salih is its only candidate for the position."[/size]
[size=45]Berwari believes that the insistence of the Union on the position, despite the fact that it won fewer seats than the "Democrat", "represents a psychological crisis due to the fragmentation of the Union Party in recent years."[/size]
[size=45]And the former parliamentarian continues: "The Union believes that obtaining the position of President of the Republic will enhance the confidence of his public in him after the decline in his popularity in Kurdistan."[/size]
[size=45]presidential candidates[/size]
[size=45]Today, Monday, the Parliament Presidency is supposed to announce the names of 26 candidates who have applied for the post of President of the Republic.[/size]
[size=45]Hakim Al-Zamili, First Deputy Speaker of Parliament, stressed the need to "accredit documents, certificates and CVs in a professional and transparent manner" for the candidates.[/size]
[size=45]Al-Zamili added, according to a statement issued by Parliament, that it is necessary to “remove any kind of political pressure that may be exercised on the relevant authorities to prevent them from performing the duties assigned to them.”[/size]
[size=45]According to the statement, last Saturday, Parliament "discussed and scrutinized all the files of the 26 candidates for the post of President of the Republic, in terms of criminal restrictions and their position on accountability, justice, scientific certificates, and their integrity."[/size]
[size=45]The most prominent candidates for the post are Hoshyar Zebari, who is supported by the "national majority" agreement, and Barham Salih, the candidate of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.[/size]
[size=45]Other names were nominated for the position of President of the Republic on the grounds of contentiousness, including the former judge in Saddam's Special Court, Rizgar Amin. Shaylan nominated Fouad Masum, the daughter of the former President of the Republic, who did not prove his worth, according to observers, and presents herself as an independent candidate.[/size]
[size=45]Omid Balati, a lawyer born in Erbil in 1979, is also nominated for the position. He ran for the presidency of the Kurdistan region in 2019, and the position of governor of Erbil last year, but he did not get any vote in either attempt.[/size]
[size=45]In addition to these candidates, Muhammad al-Basri, who is the only Arab whose name was leaked among the 26 candidates, is nominated, and he presents himself as a political analyst and is considered close to the Popular Mobilization.[/size]
[size=45]He also nominated Abdul Latif Rashid, the former Minister of Finance and a former leader in the Union, but this time he presents himself as an independent.[/size]
[size=45]2007 agreement[/size]
[size=45]On the other hand, the introduction of Hoshyar Zebari's name provokes the ire of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, and the coordination framework that represents the group of Shiite forces with the exception of the Sadrist movement.[/size]
[size=45]Hedayat Taher, a leader in Al-Ittihad, says, "The Democratic Party wants to remove us from all positions in Baghdad, as it did in the region."[/size]
[size=45]In contact with (Al-Mada), Taher accused the Democratic Party of "a coup against the 2007 agreement that was held at the time with the late President Jalal Talabani and the former president of the region, Massoud Barzani."[/size]
[size=45]The Kurdish leader added: "In 2018, the Democratic Party presented a candidate for the presidency (who is Fouad Hussein, the current foreign minister), despite the previous agreement that this position is our right."[/size]
[size=45]The National Union attacks Hoshyar Zebari, the strong candidate for the post, and Taher says: "We cannot accept him as a candidate because he was dismissed in 2016 from the position of Finance Minister due to corruption charges."[/size]
[size=45]The coordination framework, whose steps are still faltering, in agreement with Muqtada al-Sadr, the leader of the Sadrist movement, to join the "majority coalition," supports the union's view of Zebari's refusal.[/size]
[size=45]The framework has been waging a campaign against the former finance minister for days, and limited demonstrations took place in Baghdad, believed to be a "coordinating" measure against the candidate.[/size]
[size=45]Voting day[/size]
[size=45]Taher, the deputy head of the Union Party in Kirkuk, added: "The Democratic Party believes that it has a concrete alliance with al-Sadr and the Sunni forces, but we are counting on several factors to win the position."[/size]
[size=45]Among the factors on which the Union relies for the victory of its candidate, Taher says: "It is the popularity and personality of Barham Salih and his achievements, the position of some political forces on Zebari, and the reluctance of some representatives of the Sadrist movement to vote for the latter."[/size]
[size=45]The group of the opposition team to the “Majority Alliance” may reach about 100 deputies, a number that leaders in the “Coordination Committee” see as the “blocking third” in Parliament.[/size]
[size=45]The Coordinator, according to previous statements to Al-Mada, assumes that one-third is suspended and will stop “electing the president of the republic, and after that stop all procedures to form a government.”[/size]
[size=45]Article 70 of the constitution states / first: “The House of Representatives elects from among the candidates a president of the republic by a two-thirds majority of the number of its members.”[/size]
[size=45]But this “blocking” third will be less influential in paragraph “Second” of the same article, where it says: “If none of the candidates obtains the required majority, competition will take place among the candidates who obtain the highest votes, and whoever obtains the majority of votes in the second ballot is declared president.” [/size]
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