By GottaLaff
The appearance of democracy (a day of voting) is Bush's idea of Iraqi democracy:
Iraqi officials moved to quell rising tensions between rival Sunni Muslim Arab factions in once-restive Anbar province Wednesday by recounting some of the ballots that were cast in last Saturday's provincial elections, even before the official results are known.The Independent High Electoral Commission in Baghdad said it had acted after Sunni tribal leaders accused the province's ruling Iraqi Islamic Party of rigging the vote. [...]
Many signs of voting fraud were reported. Poll workers at five centers told McClatchy that they saw Iraqi Islamic Party loyalists filling out blank ballots for registered voters who didn't show and stuffing the ballot box. In one case, a poll worker said he was asked to fill out the ballots himself.
No wonder Bush calls this democracy. It so closely mirrors our own elections when he was a candidate and/or president [sic].
In another, a polling center employee said that he was ordered to leave at the end of the day so that party loyalists could fill in the ballots of voters who didn't show up.
The formal accusations of vote rigging came from Ahmed Abu Risha and other tribal leaders. Abu Risha — the Anbar head of a political movement, Iraq's Awakening Council, that grew out of a tribal group formed to battle militants — is widely credited with pacifying the province that was once a stronghold of the Sunni insurgency and al Qaida in Iraq. [...]
The city of Ramadi, at one time a killing field for U.S. soldiers who patrolled the hostile streets and deadly for residents, now is relatively calm. If Saturday's elections aren't considered credible, however, that could ignite a new round of violence. [...]
Saleh al Mutlaq, the head of another Sunni party, the Gathering of the Iraqi National Projects, said in an interview after returning from Anbar province that tribal leaders were outraged at the idea that the Iraqi Islamic Party would continue to govern there.
"Unless the electoral commission treats the complaints fairly, conflict is coming to Anbar," he said. "They cheated, and the tribal leaders will not allow them to govern them."
Security officials in Anbar braced for possible violence.
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