File this New York Times report in the What Makes You So Certain Department:
The razor-thin margin apparently captured by the Shiite alliance here in election results announced Sunday seems almost certain to enshrine a weak government that will be unable to push through sweeping changes, like granting Islam a central role in the new Iraqi state.
WHEEW! What the New York Times needs is more writers sure of themselves. The votes have JUST been counted and already — before the constitution is even drawn up — we are told the government is “almost certain” to be a weak, impotent one. Here’s more:
The verdict handed down by Iraqi voters in the Jan. 30 election appeared to be a divided one, with the Shiite political alliance, backed by the clerical leadership in Najaf, opposed in nearly equal measure by an array of mostly secular minority parties.
According to Iraqi leaders here, the fractured mandate almost certainly heralds a long round of negotiating, in which the Shiite alliance will have to strike deals with parties run by the Kurds and others, most of which are secular and broadly opposed to an enhanced role for Islam or an overbearing Shiite government.
SO? Many governments in Europe and elsewhere have coalition governments. And — believe it or not — there have been periods of time in American history when the two parties actually had to negotiate with each other, rather than play winner-takes-all politics. More:
The main responsibility of the Iraqi government over the next 10 months will be the drafting of a permanent constitution, which must pass a vote of the assembly and then be put to a vote of the people later this year. The role of Islam is widely expected to be one of the most contentious issues.
The results of the balloting appeared to leave Kurdish leaders, whose party captured more than a quarter of the assembly seats, in a particularly strong position to shape the next government. The Kurds are America’s closest allies in Iraq, and most of their leaders are of a strong secular bent.
Among the demands that the Kurds and other groups will put to Shiite leaders as the price for their cooperation will be an insistence on a more secular state and concessions on Kirkuk, the ethnically divided city that Kurdish leaders want to integrate into their regional government. Kurdish leaders also say they will insist that the Iraqi president be a Kurd.
The prospect of a divided national assembly, split between religious and secular parties, also appeared to signal a continuing role for the American government, which already maintains 150,000 troops here, to help broker disputes.
The Times is staying on message…But we digress:
As the final vote totals were being announced Sunday, Shiite leaders appeared to be scaling back their expectations, and preparing to reach out to parties in the opposition to help them form a new government.
“We have to compromise,” said Adnan Ali, a senior leader in the Dawa party, one of the largest in the Shiite coalition, called the United Iraqi Alliance. “Even though we have a majority, we will need other groups to form a government.”
But WAIT: didn’t it seem from the LEAD of this piece that all looks bleak…that there will be a “weak” government? Isn’t it a hopeful sign that they’re talking about the need to work with other factions in the country? Only a few months ago some folks were saying the elections would never be successfully held, or if they were there would be a hue and cry from some quarters challenging the elections’ legitimacy.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.