BAGHDAD, Iraq -Clergy-backed Shiites and independence-minded Kurds swept to victory in Iraq's landmark elections, propelling to power the groups that suffered most under Saddam Hussein and forcing Sunni Arabs to the margins for the first time in modern history, according to final results released yesterday.
But the Shiites' 48 percent of the vote is far short of the two-thirds majority needed to control the 275-member National Assembly. The results threw immediate focus on Iraqi leaders' back door dealmaking to create a new coalition government -possibly in an alliance with the Kurds -and on efforts to lure Sunnis into the fold and away from a bloody insurgency.
Interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, the secular Shiite chosen by the United States to lead this country for the last eight turbulent months, fared poorly -his ticket finishing a distant third behind the religious Shiites and Kurds.
This is a new birth for Iraq
election commission spokesman Farid Ayar said, announcing results of the Jan. 30 polling, the first free election in Iraq in more than 50 years and the first since Saddam fell. Iraqi voters became a legend in their confrontation with terrorists.
Iraqi Kurds danced in the streets and waved Kurdish flags when results were announced in the oil-rich, ethnically mixed city of Kirkuk. Thousands of more Kurds -a people who were gassed and forced from their homes by Saddam's forces -turned out in Sulaimaniyah, firing weapons in the air and carrying posters of their leaders.
I feel that I am born again said Bakhtiyar Mohammed, 42. I am very happy because we suffered a lot. Now I can say that I am an Iraqi Kurd with pride.
The Shiite-dominated United Iraqi Alliance ticket received 4,075,295 votes, or about 48 percent of the total cast, officials said.
The Kurdistan Alliance, a coalition of two main Kurdish parties, finished second with 2,175,551 votes, or 26 percent. And the Iraqi List headed by Allawi stood third with 1,168,943 votes, or nearly 14 percent.
Parties have three days to lodge complaints, after which the results will be certified and seats in the new Assembly distributed. Seats will generally be allocated according to the percentage of votes that each ticket won. It appeared only 12 coalitions would take seats. The Shiites stand to gain up to 140 seats, while the Kurds could end up with about 75.
This is a great victory for the Iraqi people said Ahmad Chalabi, a former Pentagon protege and member of the Shiite ticket, who is lobbying for the prime minister's post. We will have an assembly which is elected by the people and the government which is completely legitimate and elected by the people.
Other leading contenders for the top post include fellow Shiites Ibrahim Jaafari, a vice president; Finance Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi; and former nuclear scientist Hussain al-Shahristani.
The results highlighted the sharp differences among Iraq's ethnic, religious and cultural groups -many of whom fear domination not just by the Shiites, estimated at 60 percent of the population, but also by the Kurds, the most pro-American group with about 15 percent.
The results also draw attention to the close and longtime ties between now-victorious Iraqi Shiite leaders and clerics in neighboring Iran. The Shiite ticket owes its success to the support of Iraq's clerics, including Iranian-born Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.
In contrast, many Sunni Arabs, who make up an estimated 20 percent of the population, stayed home on election day, either out of fear of violence or to support a boycott call by radical clerics opposed to the U.S. military.
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The Associated Press
