After weeks of bickering and three failed attempts, Iraq’s Parliament elected a Speaker on Tuesday.
Sunni politician Salim al-Jabouri, the Deputy Secretary-General of the Islamic Party, won 194 out of the 273 votes cast, with only a handful of ballots going to his nearest rival.
Al-Jabouri’s name had been widely mentioned since Parliament re-convened, but the previous Speaker, Osama al-Nujaifi, had insisted that he would stand for re-election and only withdrew last week.
The situation was further complicated by walkouts, notably by Kurdish and Sunni MPs, which had left one Parliamentary session short of a quorum and forced the cancellation of two others.
The Parliament, whose members were elected on April 30, is supposed to choose a Speaker — a Sunni under the Iraqi Constitution — as its first order of business.
Legislators now face the challenge of naming a President and Prime Minister.
Despite the political and military threat raised by the insurgent offensive moving from northern Iraq towards Baghdad, current Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has refused to step aside.
Al-Maliki’s political bloc won the most seats in April but is far short of a majority. The Prime Minister’s escalating dispute with Kurdish leader is making the formation of a coalition Government under his lead even less likely.
