Iraq After Jaafari (the real reason Jaafari stepped down)

Time ^ | April 20 2006 | TONY KARON

[jmc1969]

Amidst rumors of a coup, the prime minister may finally be willing to step aside.

More than four months after the election, a shift in the position of incumbent prime minister may finally open the way for the creation of a new Iraqi government.

Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari announced Thursday that he would refer his nomination for a second term back to the United Iraqi Alliance, the dominant Shi'ite bloc in the new legislature. That opens the way for the Alliance to select a new candidate and break the deadlock created by the refusal of the Kurdish, Sunni and secular blocs, backed by the U.S., to accept a second Jaafari term.

The decisive intervention may have been the reported signal from, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, Iraq's leading Shi'ite spiritual authority.

Sistani may have been spurred to intervene by ominous talk in Baghdad that a group of secular, once-exiled politicians previously favored by the U.S. were planning to seize power and seek U.S. backing. Former U.S.-appointed Prime Minister Iyad Allawi suggested on Iraqi TV last weekend that Iraqi political leaders, despite being marginalized by the Iraqi electorate, might have to create an extra-constitutional “emergency government.”

One of his key allies, acting speaker of parliament Adnan Pachachi, told reporters that such a government would not be based either on the constitution or on the election results — results, he claimed, which didn't necessarily reflect the true will of the Iraqi people . Such a move would likely provoke a violent Shi'ite reaction, if not full-scale civil war, which the moderate Sistani would be anxious to avoid.

[Marine_Uncle]

"I have a feeling that one of the things that will come out of all of this is a weakening of the position of PM and a strengthening of the other leadership positions."
We should remember, the PM runs the country. The president is more a spokesman for external affairs, and all ministry posts must bend to the will of the PM.
Not having any profile on the two mentioned as alternates, I for one feel in the dark to make any comments. But the two names that where brought up do not include the SCIRI choice, being Mahdi (lost by one vote to Jaafari). Mahdi just may have been the best bet. But I don't see his name coming up of lately. Things are at least not in a state of stasis.
Surely there must be a lot of bad blood within the various elements of the UIA at this point.