Kuwaitis head today for ballot centers to cast their votes
Kuwait, Politics, 7/5/2003

Nobody can claim victory, in advance, the elections for the 10th Kuwaiti parliament which will take place today between 246 candidates competing over 50 seats in 25 electoral circles.

However, analysists expect that basic blocs in the new Ummah council (parliament) will continue to be the same as Islamists Sunni occupy 12 seats, Liberals 7 seats, in additions to the "people's work" ( al-Amal al-Shaabi ) bloc which includes 11 parliamentarians. They are 4 Shiite and Ahmad al-Sadoun ( aSunni from al- Hadar ( Urban area) as well as parliamentarians representing al-Badia and Islamists. Added to these is the government's faction which includes 16 parliamentarians in addition to the small factions of independents.

While the advisor at the Ummah council Sami Khaleifa expressed his conviction that the Sunni Islamic factions will achieve a remarkable progress beside the "people work" bloc, with a decrease for the liberal trend, a well-informed parliamentary source said that the liberal trend will preserve its current positions, while the number of parliamentarians accounted for the government will increase at the expense of the share of tribes.

The source added that changes will be tremendous in number but the general composition will not be changed much. Regardless of the result of the elections which will be announced on Sunday at dawn, there will be a sort of consensus among the competitors regardless to their political inclination, to criticize the government, regarding internal issues like making a separation between the crown prince post and the presidency of the government or ministerizing ( making the parliamentarians ministers ), corruption, democratic reforms or the economic situation as well as the phenomenon of "vote buying" or at the external level, like the position regarding what is taking place in Iraq and the relations with the "coalition," but this will not spoil the fact there are no differences over that what had happened in Iraq was a "liberation."

In a meeting with a small group of journalists, the assistant secretary of foreign media Sheikh Mubraka al-Deij al-Ibrahim al-Sabah said replying to accusations addressed to the government in interfering in the elections "we have nothing to do with this matter." He added "we deal with any parliament formed after the elections."

As for the issue of separating the post of the crown prince and the presidency of the government and what was published in the press on a decision taken by the ruling family on that, Sheikh Mubarak said that this separation is in the hand of the Amir of Kuwait Sheikh Jaber al-Ahmad al-Sabah. So far we heard nothing on that.," noting that "we have to wait after the elections to have things clarified."

Previous Stories:
  Woman's right a test for democracy in Kuwait, tomorrow   (7/4/2003)
  Straw concludes a visit to Kuwait   (7/3/2003)
  Private TV stations licensed in Kuwait   (7/3/2003)

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