Last week, the preliminary results from the April 30th parliamentary
elections in Iraq were released. It was
not a pretty sight.
The western press had called Nouri the victor before the
campaigning even started. But the
results demonstrated Nouri al-Maliki was just as unpopular in 2014 as he was in
2010.
But somehow the press needed to spin this as a sweeping
victory for Nouri.
He won nothing.
State of Law, his political coalition, won 92 or 93 or 94
seats depending upon whether you were reading Reuters, AP or AFP. That's not enough to be dubbed prime
minister-designate and begin forming a Cabinet.
Nouri defined his goal ahead of the elections.
He wanted no form of a power-sharing government. He wanted a majority rule government.
In order to have that, he needed to secure 165 seats in
Parliament. He failed.
So he lost.
He will now have to woo other political blocs and try to get
them to join in a coalition with him.
As you reflect on what we're writing, you're no doubt not
only thinking, "He didn't win." You're
probably also thinking, "Why would the press play this as a victory?"
That's a good question.
And we may have the answer for you.
See, Nouri didn't win in 2006 and he didn't win in 2010.
So how did he get two terms as prime minister?
Because the US government demanded it. Under Bully Boy Bush, the US government nixed
Ibrahim al-Jafaari and demanded Nouri be named prime minister. That was 2006. Four years later, US President Barack Obama
demanded that Nouri get a second term even though the voters had said
otherwise. He ordered US officials in
Iraq to negotiate a contract (The Erbil Agreement) which would go around the
voters and the Iraqi Constitution to give Nouri a second term.
Is it possible that the press is yet again serving the
interests of empire, specifically US domination, by attempting to portray
embarrassing results for Nouri as some form of a sweeping victory?
The Western press has long had a truth problem when it came
to Iraq. Since 2002, it has actively
misled and lied -- with few exceptions -- about the realities of Iraq -- both pre-invasion and post-invasion.
Last week's bad coverage looks less like stupidity and more
like duplicity -- an effort by the western press to make those outside of Iraq
believe Nouri achieved something when, in fact, he failed at his stated goal
and, even with serious allegations of voter fraud (2 million dead voted in the
election would be one of the more serious charges), he wasn't able to pull off
anything that could pass for a victory.
