Sadr rival bloc supports 'constitutional' snap elections

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The pro-Iran Shiite parliamentary faction known as the Coordination Framework on Thursday said that it supports any “constitutional path” to resolve the current political impasse in Iraq, including holding snap elections, a day after rival Muqtada al-Sadr called for an early vote.

Influential Shiite leader Sadr on Wednesday called for the dissolution of the current legislature and holding a snap parliamentary vote in Iraq amidst demonstrations and a sit-in at the Iraqi parliament building by his supporters in protest of the Coordination’s Framework prime minister pick.

“The Coordination Framework affirms its support for any constitutional path to resolve the political crises and achieving the interests of the people, including early elections,” read a statement from the Shiite alliance on Thursday evening.

The statement added that the “constitutional institutions” must be respected and that a safe environment must be provided for the process to occur.

The remarks were reemphasized by the faction’s most prominent figure, former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who stated that sticking to the constitutional and legal mechanisms was “the only option” to prevent crises from occurring, stressing that new elections must be free from the “tampering process” that previous elections were subjected to.

Iraq held early elections in October 2021, in response to massive protests across the country in 2019 against corruption and lack of employment. The Coordination Framework quickly rejected the results of the elections, alleging fraud and calling for the abolishment of the vote.

The Sadrist Movement emerged as the bloc with the highest number of seats in the vote gaining 73 seats, almost double the number of its closest competition, the Sunni Taqadum Alliance, which gained 37 seats.

All 73 Sadrist MPs resigned from the parliament in June upon the call of their leader Sadr, who referred to their withdrawal from the legislature as a “sacrifice” to end the political deadlock that has plagued Iraq since October’s elections.

With Iraq’s political scene now more uncertain than ever, Sadrist supporters are set to gather for mass prayer in Baghdad on Friday, honoring a tradition of Mohammed Sadiq al-Sadr, Sadr’s father, who united masses of Shiites in Friday prayer, as a sign of opposing the rule of toppled Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

This would mark the Sadrists’ second mass prayer within the last four weeks.