120 candidates withdraw or stop campaigns for Kurdistan’s parliament

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — Of the 773 candidates approved by the electoral body to run for parliament in the Kurdistan Region, 120 of them have either withdrawn, boycotted, or stopped campaigning for various disclosed and undisclosed reasons.

The Coalition for Justice and Development (CDJ) submitted the names of 100 candidates, and then boycotted the election claiming a failure of the electoral body to clean the voter roll of names of the dead and repeat names. However, two CDJ candidates recently defied their party’s decision and declared they will be participating in the election.

On Tuesday, the Abnalnahrain List withdrew five candidates from the election process. They claimed the election law was not amended and that the Christian quota had been interfered with.

But there are also health and financial reasons behind the withdrawal of candidates from the election process.

The Kurdistan Islamic Group (Komal) had 40 candidates, but some have quietly stopped campaigning.

“Out of the 40 candidates of our list, 15 have withdrawn from the process,” said a Komal candidate on the condition of anonymity.

He said the Komal leadership has poorly funded their campaigning.

“I decided to withdraw from election campaigning because of personal reasons. But I don’t know why the others have done so,” Payam Faruq, a Komal candidate who has withdrawn from the process, told Rudaw.

Hawzhin Omar, the head of Komal’s election office and also a candidate for parliament, dismissed claims Komal candidates have withdrawn from the process.

“Although we gave little money to our candidates for campaign purposes, no Komal candidate has officially withdrawn from the process. There are some Komal candidates not campaigning for two reasons. 

“First, Komal nominated some women so there are women representatives of the party too. These women are not campaigning. Second, there are others who just don’t want to campaign. These candidates have not withdrawn from the election. They are just not campaigning.”

Shokhan Karim, a Change Movement candidate, also decided to stop campaigning. 

“I am still a Gorran candidate, but not participating in the election campaign due to health reasons. My doctor recommended I stay at home. I therefore officially asked Gorran’s electoral committee to accept my withdrawal from election campaigning.”

However, the phenomenon is not limited to opposition parties. Parez Omar, a PUK candidate for parliament, decided to end her campaign.

“I withdraw due to personal and party reasons. I cannot say why I withdrew now. I will declare the reason in the next few days,” she said.

The CDJ is the only party to officially announce it was not participating in the election on September 30. 

Campaigning runs until September 28. The Kurdistan Region’s electorate will choose 111 candidates for the next parliament in their first election since 2013.