Gareth Porter (JWN commenter) has written a piece for IPS stating that,
- Reports compiled by the U.S. military in Iraq from its informants and by non-governmental organisations from independent Iraqi sources provide the first detailed picture of a campaign of ballot fraud by Kurdish authorities in Nineveh province, the key to the outcome of the Oct. 15 constitutional referendum.
They show that officials of the Kurdish Democratic Party bused non-resident Kurds to vote in polling stations in various non-Kurdish areas of Nineveh and created a climate of fear and intimidation in the province that reduced the vote against the constitution on the Nineveh plain. They also support Sunni charges of fraudulent vote totals in the province.
Porter writes,
- The final official vote total for Nineveh was 395,000 “no” and 323,000 “yes”. However the [Independent Election Commission in Iraq] in Nineveh had told the media on Oct. 16 and again on Oct. 17 that 327,000 people had voted for the constitution and only 90,000 against, with only 25 out of the 300 polling stations in the province remaining to be counted.
Thus, between the two counts, 5,000 yes votes had apparently disappeared and 295,000 no votes had mysteriously materialised — all from only 25 polling places. No explanation has ever been provided by election authorities for those contradictory data. The U.S. military’s informant supports the view that Kurdish and Sunni vote totals in Mosul were significantly altered.
In the towns north and east of [the province’s capital,] Mosul, the military’s reporting suggests the main factor in distorting the vote was the use by Kurdish authorities of “flying voters” and voter intimidation…
The picture appears a little unclear from this account. First of all, it is quite amazing if the IECI was in any position to give any kind of an original estimate as early as Oct 16 or Oct 17, given the weather and other conditions in the country at the time and the logistical challenges in gathering and counting so many paper ballots. If IECI people were giving estimates at that time– and I do recall something like that– then those estimates themselves can have been based on little more than thin air and wishful thinking. (Rather like Condi Rice’s “calling” of the referendum on the morning of the 16th…. What an amazing feat of non-reality-based chutzpah that was, eh?)
Oh, right. Here is an informative IPS report by Gareth Porter datelined Oct. 19, in which he reported that the IECI had claimed that 326,000 people in Nineveh had voted Yes and 90,000 had voted No.
So I guess if the IECI had been giving out such an unlikely estimate that early, pretty soon afterwards someone must have taken them aside and said, “You know, those figures are just simply not credible… You’ll have to do better than that!” So off they went and came back with the 55%-45% result: “Oh sorry, chaps, our side has still ‘won’ — even if we did it with only 45% of the total!”
One of the sources of reporting on the shenanigans in Nineveh that Porter used in his latest piece was Michael Youash of the Iraq Sustainable Democracy Project, a Washington DC-based group that is concerned with protecting the interests especially of Iraq’s most vulnerable groups, which it defines as “ChaldoAssyrians and also Turkmens, Yezidis, Shabaks and Mandaeans”. Much of Youash’s information had come, in turn, from members of those minorities inside Nineveh.
(By the way, can anyone tell me anything about the Shabaks? You know “Shabak” is the Hebrew word for the Shin Bet, and I’ve a feeling that many reports of Israeli covert activities in northern Iraq might have originated with references to members of Iraq’s own Shabak community… But no-one I’ve spoke to seems to know very much about them… )
Anyway, clearly at a time big inter-group strife in the country, members of all of its small minorities must be feeling very vulnerable, and in danger of getting run over by the nearest demographic/sectarian steamroller, whether it’s the Kurds or the Shiites or the Sunnis– or squezzed hard between two of the steamrollers… Sort of like the Gypsies/Roma in the war-torn lands of former Yugoslavia: always distrusted, always vulnerable.
But I digress. Actually, there is very little at all that sincere lovers of democratic practice can feel good about regarding the modalities, conduct, or outcome of the Iraqi referendum. Porter’s report just adds to the already depressing nature of the general picture.
Just of to bed (it is 3.50 am here in UK) but I found the following about the Shabak via Google:
Shabak Culture:
Shabak are Kurdish descendants from partly Turcoman Shiite tribes that migrated to the east of the Ottoman Empire from Persia (Iran) up until the 17th Century. The Shabak live near Mosul, Iraq. The Shabak emerged as a distinct ethnic group around the 16th Century against the backdrop of the Ottoman-Persian conflict in the area. The Shabak can be found along the fringe areas of Iraqi Kurdistan from Tall’Afar, Iraq to Mosul and Kirkuk and on to Khanaqin, Iraq. Their religious beliefs contain elements of Sunni and Shiite Islam and some Christian beliefs as well. When asked about their religion though Shabak are likely to say they are just Muslim. The Shabak also maintain close ties with the Yazidi and even make pilgrimages to Yazidi shrines.
The exact number of Shabak is unknown with census data that indicates there may be about 15,000 Shabak residing in 35 villages as well as in Mosul. Some scholars consider the Shabak Kurds while others stress their Turcoman features. The Shabak speak a Kurdish dialect mixed with Turkish, Persian and Arabic. The Shabak have a sacred book called “Buyruk” and it is written in Turcoman. All this makes the ethnic background of the Shabak unclear and open to debate.
There are also tribes within the Shabak people such as the Gergari, Bajalan, Hariri, and the Mawsil. The name Shabak is derived from the Arabic word shabaka, which means to intertwine. This name may be very appropriate since the Shabak are made up of many tribes with different tribes from different historical backgrounds and sharing both Muslim Sunni and Shiite beliefs and speaking with very similar, but different dialects.
The status of the Shabak in Iraq has historically been fairly low with most Shabak working as sharecroppers on farms in the areas where they reside.
I am “shocked, shocked!”
Why Helena? Tell us one a single job that’s done ok in Iraq from day one when US went in till now?
When we talk most of you they think we hate Americans and their puppet guys, this is the reality Helena don’t be “Shocked”, the funny thing a about the voting boxes that stolen by Kurdish “Bashmargah” was returned after while and the voting centre counted them!!!! What a funny polling and funny election whatever you call it.
This is GWB keep telling you there is progress in Iraq and the freedom and democracy rises in ME as Candy also repeat this also.
BTW, one thing here people may keep telling us there is Yazidi, Shabak, Sunni and Kurds this or that we all Iraqi knew ourselves very well and we knew how to live together I think these call of “inventions” as some journalists or “Experts” putting in to you in your news its facts their in Iraq on the ground we well knows them and it not need Very Intelligent Experts to tell us there is discovery of Iraqi society this is just funny business.
The problem you know nothing about Iraq this is the reality you need to believe it.
Salah, “Shocked, Shocked!” in quots is a reference to the film “Casablanca”, in which the corrupt chief of police, who has spent all evening at the roulette tables, arrests the boss of the establishment, announcing that he is “shocked, shocked!” to discover that there is gambling on the premises.
Yes, sorry there Salah… I should have put in an irony alert. But it would be hard to fit it into the title…
“…the main factor in distorting the vote was the use by Kurdish authorities of “flying voters” and voter intimidation…”
The Kurdish mafiosi did the same thing in the so-called “election” in January – you know, the one that produced the current so-called “freely elected” so-called “government” now in place. Prior to the “election” the Kurdish mafiosi shipped Kurds from all over to Kirkuk and set them up in tent camps on the outskirts of town in a clear effort to skew the demographics of the city. They used intimidation tactics against non-Kurds, particularly Christians (mainly Assyrians, Chaldeans) and Turkmens, and of course any Kurd who dared show a sign of dissent from their positions. They also managed to be unable to open polling places and/or deliver ballots in towns, villages, and districts where non-Kurds – particularly Christians – dominate the population. I saw virtually nothing about this in the English language press at the time, and cannot help but wonder at the sudden interest now following this joke of a so-called “referendum”.
And by the way, there is nothing independent about the so-called Independent Election Commission. They are anbd have always been controlled both directly and indirectly by the Americans, as is the so-called “government”.