Iraqi election turn-out higher?

Amid the mayhem in Iraq in 2005, there took place an event that was quite unprecedented in the Arab world—the first Iraqi elections, conducted under the supervision of the unsung Paul Bremer. There were enduring images from that election, of ink-stained fingers held aloft by men and women who had exercised their brand-new right to vote—empurpled digits held up, for the cameras of the world, as an “up yours” to Saddam Hussein and his Baathists, to “Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia,” and to every sanguinary insurgent who would kill to stop the implanting in Iraq of democracy. Iraq has seen other elections since that first one—sometimes twice a year. They have all been significant, though none has been as profusely emotional as the first. With the exception of the latter, which the Sunnis stupidly boycotted, turnout has been consistently high—certainly higher than the turnout in most American elections. And so it should be, one expects, on Sunday, March 7, when Iraqis vote—yet again—for the government of their choice. We have not, of course, reached a position where we can talk about “just another Iraqi election.” But if you look at how our newspapers are covering the run-up to the event, you will see in the reporting the sorts of observations that might be made in the last lap before an Indian general election, or a South African, Brazilian, or Turkish one. There are accounts of colorful billboards and posters, of infighting within parties over prospective alliances, of candidates doling out gifts—free chickens, sports shoes, clothes, even money—to cannily undecided voters. Accounts of violence do not predominate, and no one is asking—as they did with trepidation in 2005, and as they have done, often, since—whether Iraq will be safe enough for people to vote. here

Massoud Barzani, the president of Iraq's Kurdish region, a former guerrilla fighter, has led the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) since 1979,

The KDP is one of the two dominant parties in the northern Kurdish region.The KDP banded together with the rival Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), led by Jalal, Iraq's current president, to run the region.