IRAQ VOTE RESULT

by RAY FLEMING
THE Iraq government and the United States are entitled to be cautiously optimistic about the positive result of the referendum on the Iraqi constitution announced yesterday. Overall, on a 63 per cent turnout, 79 per cent said Yes to the referendum and 21 per cent rejected it. In any normal national referendum that would be a very satisfactory result indeed but Iraq cannot be compared with other countries and within the result there was a unanimous warning from the Sunni Arab communities that the provisions of the constitution are not acceptable to them. Indeed, in two Sunni provinces the vote was more than two-thirds for rejection and in a third it was within 11 per cent of a two-thirds No vote. Had Nineveh, that third Sunni province, followed the other two the constitution would have failed for the whole country despite the strong affirmative vote in all the other fifteen provinces. The No votes in Anbar and Salahuddin were 96 and 81 per cent respectively. The lesson from this outcome is that the Sunni Arab population of Iraq remains solidly opposed to the plans for the future of the country, formulated mainly by the Shiite and Kurd leaders, despite the last minute offer made by the Shiites and Kurds to the Sunnis that the constitution was not set in concrete and could be renegotiated after the referendum. The Sunnis, buoyed by their voting strength, will now want to see what compromises the Shiites and Kurds are ready to offer to produce a constitutional formula less likely to leave them isolated in a federal state than does the document on the table at the moment. But if the constitution is changed substantially may not those who voted in favour want to change their mind? There will be some very tough bargaining in the coming weeks and it is not at all clear what will happen to the proposed election in December if a prior agreement is not reached among the three parties. Twelve provinces recorded Yes votes of more than 90 per cent, with Irbil reaching 99.36 per cent. In his heyday Saddam Hussein could have have done better. The United Nations election teams have looked at these results and found that there is no evidence of vote rigging.