Iraqi Kurdistan legislative election, 2009
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The Kurdistan Region parliamentary elections of 2009 took place on 25 July 2009. A total of 2.5 million citizens of Kurdistan Region were eligible to vote for the parliamentary and presidential elections. People currently living outside Kurdistan Region were not allowed to vote. The elections followed the
2005 Kurdistan Region parliamentary election The Kurdistan Region parliamentary elections of 2005 for the parliament of the Kurdistan Region, were held on 30 January 2005, to coincide with the January 2005 Iraqi parliamentary election and elections to the governorate councils. It was the firs ...
. The parliamentary elections coincided with the direct election of the President of Kurdistan. Unlike the parliamentary elections in 2005, the president of Kurdistan was to be chosen directly through popular votes. A referendum to approve the constitution of Kurdistan Region originally planned for the same day was put back to 1 August.MP: delaying Kurdistan constitution not ‘fair’
, ''AK News'', 2009-07-07
Campaigning for the elections officially started on 22 June 2009 and was to be stopped 48 hours before voting started. The elections were held with 84 registration centers and 5,403 polling stations in Kurdistan Region and 5 polling stations in Baghdad.


Supervision

The elections for the
Kurdistan National Assembly The Parliament of Kurdistan ( ku, پەرلەمانی كوردستان ,Perlemanê Kurdistanê or simply Perleman, ar, برلمان كردستان, links=https://www.parliament.krd/arabic/), also called the Kurdish Parliament (IKP), is the par ...
were administered by the Independent High Electoral Commission. In addition, international observers monitored the elections, including from the European Commission. The elections were originally scheduled to take place on 19 May, but were delayed until 25 July.


Minorities

Eleven of the 111 seats are reserved for minorities. Five are reserved for
Assyrians Assyrian may refer to: * Assyrian people, the indigenous ethnic group of Mesopotamia. * Assyria, a major Mesopotamian kingdom and empire. ** Early Assyrian Period ** Old Assyrian Period ** Middle Assyrian Empire ** Neo-Assyrian Empire * Assyrian ...
, five for
Turkmen Turkmen, Türkmen, Turkoman, or Turkman may refer to: Peoples Historical ethnonym * Turkoman (ethnonym), ethnonym used for the Oghuz Turks during the Middle Ages Ethnic groups * Turkmen in Anatolia and the Levant (Seljuk and Ottoman-Turkish desc ...
, and one for Armenians. The Assyrian seats will be contested by four lists, the Turkmen seats by four as well and the Armenian seat by three individuals.Election campaigns begin in earnest in Kurdistan
, '' Kurdish Globe'', 2009-05-02


Voting system

The voting system to be used is the
closed list Closed list describes the variant of party-list systems where voters can effectively only vote for political parties as a whole; thus they have no influence on the party-supplied order in which party candidates are elected. If voters had some inf ...
system, as was used for the
2005 Kurdistan Region parliamentary election The Kurdistan Region parliamentary elections of 2005 for the parliament of the Kurdistan Region, were held on 30 January 2005, to coincide with the January 2005 Iraqi parliamentary election and elections to the governorate councils. It was the firs ...
. The open list system had been introduced for the
2009 Iraqi governorate elections Governorate or provincial elections were held in Iraq on 31 January 2009, to replace the local councils in fourteen of the eighteen governorates of Iraq that were elected in the 2005 Iraqi governorate elections. 14,431 candidates, including 3,91 ...
elsewhere in Iraq, and the decision to stay with a closed list was criticised by members of the Kurdistan National Assembly who argued open lists strengthened the relationship between voters and candidates and reduced corruption.Kurdistan parliament elections between closed and open lists
, ''Ak News'', 2009-03-04
At least 30% of the candidates on each list must be female.


Electoral candidates

There were 509 candidates running in the elections, from 25 parties or lists. Five of these entities were electoral alliances and others were political parties. The two main Kurdish parties - the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iraq of Kurdistan President
Masoud Barzani Masoud Barzani ( ku, ,مه‌سعوود بارزانی, translit=Mesûd Barzanî}; born 16 August 1946) is a Kurdish politician who has been leader of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) since 1979, and was President of the Kurdistan Region o ...
and the
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK; ku, یەکێتیی نیشتمانیی کوردستان, translit=Yekîtiya Nîştimanî ya Kurdistanê) is a political party active in Kurdistan Region and the disputed territories in Iraq. The PUK describe ...
of the President of Iraq, Jalal Talabani - continued their electoral coalition in the
Kurdistani List The Kurdistan List ( ku, ليست كوردستان Lîstî Kurdistani), also known as the Kurdistan Alliance or the Brotherhood List, is the name of the electoral coalition that ran in the Kurdistan Regional Government parliamentary elections in ...
. They were challenged by the
Change List Change or Changing may refer to: Alteration * Impermanence, a difference in a state of affairs at different points in time * Menopause, also referred to as "the change", the permanent cessation of the menstrual period * Metamorphosis, or change, ...
led by Nawshirwan Mustafa, the former deputy secretary general of the PUK and
Jawhar Namiq Jawhar Namiq Salm (Salim Sorani) (July 1, 1946 – March 22, 2011), was a political leader and first president of the Kurdistan National Assembly. Early life Jawhar Namiq Salim Ismail Darwish Murad Khan was born in 1946 in the village Birlout, ...
, a former secretary general of the KDP and speaker of the
Kurdistan National Assembly The Parliament of Kurdistan ( ku, پەرلەمانی كوردستان ,Perlemanê Kurdistanê or simply Perleman, ar, برلمان كردستان, links=https://www.parliament.krd/arabic/), also called the Kurdish Parliament (IKP), is the par ...
. The Kurdistan Islamic Union and Islamic Group in Kurdistan formed a coalition with two secular parties called the Service and Reform List. The full list of entities, each with their lot number, are listed below: Armenian individuals: * Aram Shahine Dawood Bakoyan (74) * Eshkhan Malkon Sargisyan (73) * Aertex Morses Sargisyan (75)


Campaign

During the campaign, the electoral commission was reported to have fined the Kurdistani List 3 million riyals for unspecified electoral violations. A poll of 1,000 people by the Kurdistan-based Point Organization for Opinion Polls & Strategic Studies found most thought the Change List would pose a serious challenge but 49% thought the Kurdistani List would use "threats and fraud".Count Your Change
'' Newsweek'', 2009-06-24
The Change List has accused the ruling parties of sacking
regional government Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of public administration within a particular sovereign state. This particular usage of the word government refers specifically to a level of administration that is both geographically-loca ...
employees who had links to their party. They also claimed that a colonel in the
peshmerge The Peshmerga ( ku, پێشمەرگه, Pêşmerge, lit=those who face death) is the Kurdish military forces of the autonomous Kurdistan Region of Iraq. According to the Constitution of Iraq, the Peshmerga, along with their security subsidiaries, ...
regional army had been arrested for supporting them. A Kurdistani List candidate responded by saying "''No party allows its members to vote for another list''". The Progress List also accused regional intelligence agents of threatening to kill their supporters.Peshkewtin List says Kurdish security forces "Asayish" threaten to kill supporters of other party
''eKurd'', 2009-06-29
Supporters of the change List were shot at in Kifri. Supporters of the Kurdistani and Change Lists clashed in Sulaimaniyah and were separated by police wielding taser guns.
Worker-communist Party of Kurdistan The Worker-communist Party of Kurdistan ( Kurdish: , translit. ''Hizbi Komonisti Krekari Kurdistan'') is a Marxist political party in Iraqi Kurdistan. The party was established in March 2008 when the Kurdistan branch of the Worker-communist Pa ...
boycotted the elections because conditions and principles for a fair elections were not met.


Results

Initial reports gave the Kurdistani List 60 percent of the vote, equating to around 55 seats. The Change List claimed it had won around 28 seats. According to the Los Angeles Times, "Change mounted a spirited challenge to the monopoly on power of the two main parties, the Kurdistan Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, making this the first competitive election the semiautonomous enclave has seen. Turnout was put at 78.5%, an indication of the enthusiasm the contest has generated among Kurds." The following tables show the results of the parliamentary and presidential votes by party and by presidential candidate. Seats in yellow indicate reserved minority seats.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kurdistan Region Legislative Election, 2009 2009 elections in Iraq 2009 in Iraqi Kurdistan
2009 File:2009 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The vertical stabilizer of Air France Flight 447 is pulled out from the Atlantic Ocean; Barack Obama becomes the first African American to become President of the United States; 2009 Iran ...
July 2009 events in Iraq