Sadr wins poll, forming govt far off

BAGHDAD: Final results from Iraq’s election confirmed on Saturday that an alliance spearheaded by populist cleric Moqtada Sadr has triumphed, but the preacher faces a huge task to form a governing coalition. Sadr’s Marching Towards Reform bloc won 54 of the 329 seats in parliament in a major upset at a May 12 vote that saw a record level of abstentions as Iraqis turned their back on a widely reviled elite. The nationalist — whose militia battled US troops after the 2003 invasion — faces a deeply fragmented political landscape and opposition after he called for foreign influence in Iraq to be cut.

Negotiations — which tentatively began after the vote — look set to drag out and it remains far from certain that Sadr’s group will claim power after the first vote since the defeat of the IS group. Poised in second place with some 47 seats is the Conquest Alliance made up of ex-fighters from mainly paramilitary units that battled IS. The Victory Alliance bloc of Prime Minister Haider al Abadi, who hoped voters would reward him for seeing off the militants, performed worse than expected and was back in third place on 42 seats. Sadr declared on Twitter that the results showed “reform has won and corruption is weakened,” but he faces a tricky regional context as he begins coalition negotiations. — AFP