First female Communist ‘social justice’
Victory of Sadrist-Communist alliance in Iraq’s elections has challenged assumptions about country’s politics
The biggest winner in Saturday’s elections was the boycott movement, which was evident after it emerged that only 44.5 percent of eligible voters went to the polls.
But those who did vote overwhelmingly cast their ballot for the Sairoun Alliance, a coalition of supporters of the Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and the Iraqi Communist Party (ICP), as well as the smaller Iraqi Republican Party.
One of those who appears to best typify the new politics is Suhad al-Khateeb, a communist who won a parliamentary seat for the religious city of Najaf – one of the most important hubs of Shia Islamic theology.
Khateeb, who is a teacher, anti-poverty activist and womens rights activist, had not considered running in previous parliamentary elections.
“I didn’t run in the [2014] election, but I was part of a group that visited people all over the Najaf,” she told Middle East Eye.
“We visited them to listen to their problems and help them, in the slums of Najaf and the poor neighbourhoods. I had not thought about running in elections.”
