Iraqi and international election monitors have flatly rejected a surprise ruling by Iraq's parliament that aimed to tilt the odds even further against the No side in next week's referendum on the constitution.Read the whole thing here.
Trying to fine-tune vote counting procedures, the National Assembly decided this week to adopt two different definitions for "voter", creating a built-in bias in favour of passing the draft constitution.
But the ruling showed a basic "misunderstanding" of election rules, which should define voters only as "those who go to the ballot box and put their paper in", according to Iraq's chief election commissioner, Farid Ayar.
So they tried to pull a fast one and got caught. There is a real fear that the Sunnis in three provinces will reject the constitution and that will send everything back to square one, so to ensure that didn't happen the National Assembly tried to change the rules at the last moment, only to have their own election commission, backed by international observers, tell them -- "No Way!"
That's good. A rigged election would be even worse than a defeat.
UPDATE:
Mohammed at Iraq the Model comments:
The National Assembly has lost a big chunk of its credibility and today’s correction cannot remove the scar caused by yesterday’s blunder.Read it here.
Although I have my objections to several articles of the draft constitution, I will certainly respect my people’s choice and I do believe that half a step forward is still better than many steps backward.
I still see this constitution as an upgradeable project that can be improved for better performance in the future and it’s much better than the no-constitution-state and the chaos that would accompany that.
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