Iran-backed party secures large number of minority seats in Iraqi parliament

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – A political wing of an Iran-backed militia has secured four seats of a Christian quota in the Iraqi parliament, according to preliminary data released by the electoral commission.

The Babylon Movement has won four out of the five seats allocated to the religious minority, increasing the number of its representatives in the parliament from two to four.

Despite the win, many Christians argue this is not organic evidence that the minority supports the movement, which tends to partner with the largest pro-Iran camp, the Fatih Alliance, because non-Christians may also vote for who gets the minority seats.

Founded in 2014, the Babylon Movement was formed out of the Babylon Brigade which is an armed militia and a part of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF). Rayan al-Kaldani, the Christian head of the movement, is sanctioned by the US treasury for human rights abuses and corruption.

An independent candidate has won the fifth seat.

Iraqis headed to the polls for an early election on Sunday. The vote was held under a new electoral law that radically changed the system and expanded the number of constituencies from 18 to 83. There are 329 seats in the Iraqi parliament, nine are reserved by minorities which were not limited to voting districts and ballots were cast for them from around the country.

The Independent High Electoral Commission (IHEC) released preliminary results on Monday, a day after the election. The results handed out unexpected victories and devastating blows, angering some parties that alleged fraud. The commission started a manual count on Tuesday of over 8,000 polling stations that were not electronically counted, some because of technical issues. 

However, some Christians voted for Kurdish political parties.

The Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) received over a thousand votes in the predominantly Christian neighborhood of Ainkawa over 200 votes were cast for the Kurdistan Patriotic Union (PUK).

More than a million Christians used to live in Iraq before the US invasion in 2003, but that number is now estimated to about 300,000 in 2021 because of sectarian violence and the ISIS war. Many have immigrated abroad, and many of those who remain have taken shelter in the Kurdistan Region.

Christians have no real representation either in Iraq or Kurdistan Region when it comes to the parliament, writer Nasim Sadiq told Rudaw last month. 

"We don't have the right to select our real MPs," he said. "How can we then dream for other rights such as to have our own province dedicated for Christians in the Nineveh Plains."

The early election was called in response to youth-led protests that demanded a shake-up of the ruling system during mass demonstrations in 2019, dubbed the Tishreen (October) movement. The turnout was a record-low 41 percent.