ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Influential Shiite cleric and leader of the Sadrist Movement Muqtada al-Sadr on Saturday evening thanked the MPs who attended the unsuccessful parliamentary session earlier in the day to elect Iraq's next president, promising to try again Wednesday when the parliament will meet again in an attempt to elect a president.
The cleric thanked "everyone who attended the session out of love for Iraq," including the Emtidad Movement, the Kurdish New Generation party, independents, and finally the Save the Homeland Alliance – consisting of the Sadrist Movement, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), and the Sunni Sovereignty Alliance.
"These people are not terrified by threats or tempted by temptation," he added, saying "your appointment will be renewed next Wednesday with those who will join again to remove corruption, dependency, and consensus," while once again calling for a national majority government.
Sadr said that Iraq will not return to "al-Attar's mixture", a phrase referring to the failure of the government based on political consensus, and saying that "today, we have proven that there is no place for quotas."
The adjournment of Saturday's parliamentary session to Wednesday came as the tripartite alliance failed to secure the 220 MPs needed to meet the legal quorum, with only 202 MPs attending and thus falling short of the minimum to initiate the vote for Iraq's new president.
The primary candidates for the presidency are the KDP's Reber Ahmed, backed by the tripartite alliance, and incumbent Barham Salih of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), backed by the Coordination Framework, a pro-Iran Shiite parliamentary alliance.
A host of parties and alliances boycotted the session, including the Coordination Framework, the PUK, the Kurdistan Islamic Union (KIU), the Kurdistan Justice Party (KJP), and various independent MPs.
Iraq held snap elections on October 10. The vote was called in response to mass protests in the country beginning in October 2019, caused by widespread dissatisfaction with Iraq's politicians and endemic corruption in the country.
