Kurdish Parties Target Yezidi Vote in Iraq Elections

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Kurdistan’s two main political parties have nominated a large number of Yezidis for Iraq’s parliamentary elections in April, hoping to give the minority a voice in Baghdad and increase their own seats in parliament.

The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) has its own list of 22 Yezidi candidates, and the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) has 25.

Khairi Shangali, deputy of the PUK representative in Nineveh province, said that the nomination of so many Yezidis will benefit his party’s bloc in the elections, which are due on April 22.

Sarbast Bapiri, the KDP representative in Shangal, said that his party also hopes to gain more seats by targeting the Yezidi vote in Nineveh.

The nomination of this large number of Yezidis is justifiable because the majority of the population in the area are from the minority Kurdish sect, said Arif Rushdi, the PUK representative in Mosul.

In the last Iraqi elections one of PUK’s seats in parliament was secured by the votes it got from the Yezidi community.

Saeed Batush, a Yezidi politician, said that this large number of candidates will hopefully increase the Yezidi seats in the Iraqi parliament.

The PUK and the KDP, Kurdistan’s two major political parties together with the opposition Change Movement (Gorran), have often fared well in Nineveh provincial and parliamentary elections thanks to the Yezidi votes.

Dilshad Naman,  a KDP candidate in Shekhan district said that, “The Yezidis always make up 70 percent of the votes cast in favor of the Kurdish bloc in Nineveh.”

The KDP and PUK, who are partners in the outgoing cabinet, have decided to run separately in the coming elections.

Local KDP officials say they had suggested a joint list in the province in order to create a united Kurdish voice, but that the PUK had rejected the suggestion.

“We made the suggestion for a joint list so as to prevent the Kurdish voice from scattering,” said Saeed Mamozini, a KDP official in Mosul. “But the PUK was not receptive to our initiative."

In response, PUK officials in the multiethnic province say they did not have a good experience running with the KDP in last year’s Iraqi provincial elections.

“We ran with the KDP on one joint list but the KDP did not give us any administrative posts afterwards,” said Rushdi. “That's why we decided to run separately this time round, and not enter into any kind of alliances."