US embassy cable - 05BAGHDAD4426

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 BAGHDAD 004426 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/27/2015 
TAGS: PGOV, KDEM, IZ, Sunni Arab, Elections 
SUBJECT: SUNNI ARABS HEAD INTO ELECTIONS DIVIDED AND 
WITHOUT CLEAR REJECTION OF INSURGENCY 
 
Classified By: Charge d'Affaires David Satterfield. 
Reasons 1.4 (B) and (D) 
 
1. (C) SUMMARY AND COMMENT: With only two days left 
before the registration deadline, there is no united 
Sunni Arab coalition in the offing for the December 
elections.  Sunni Arab leaders, fractured since 
Saddam's fall, appear just as divided heading into the 
coming vote.  There is no preeminent leader among them 
and no shared vision for the future.  They are against 
federalism and the constitution but torn over the 
relevance of a Ba'athist platform in a post-Saddam 
world.  As a result, the competing lists that are 
emerging appear to be marriages of convenience, not 
conviction.  Each slate mixes Islamists, nationalists, 
pan-Arabists, neo-Ba'athists, tribal shaykhs and 
liberals. 
 
2. (C) SUMMARY AND COMMENT: Most influential Sunni 
Arab leaders have decided not to join Allawi's 
coalition because they appear convinced that 
marginalized Sunni Arabs will want to vote for their 
sect, not for a rainbow coalition.  Many Sunni Arab 
leaders are also stopping short of forming tickets 
that denounce the insurgency because they appear 
convinced that Sunni Arab voters are too aggrieved and 
sympathetic to the resistance to vote against it.  As 
a result, Allawi's coalition may offer Sunni Arabs the 
only clear vote against the insurgency and for cross- 
sectarian cooperation. The remaining slates will 
funnel votes toward mixed lists of candidates who 
reject the status quo but offer wildly different 
approaches to changing it. END SUMMARY AND COMMENT. 
 
3. (C) Sunni Arab leaders united in rejecting the 
constitution have failed to converge on a single plank 
for the December elections.  Some appear to have split 
because of disagreements over the legitimacy of the 
insurgency but most appear to have split because of 
ego clashes and continuing differences over the 
relevance of Ba'athist ideology in a post-Saddam age. 
The National Dialogue Council, an amalgam of Islamists 
and Ba'athists who joined the constitution drafting 
committee, appears to have fractured for good. 
 
4. (C) All of the slates will promise voters a 
thorough re-working of Iraq's constitution and a 
rollback of federalism.  They are also likely to pay 
lip service to national unity while pushing a clearly 
Sunni-dominant agenda.  Sunni Arab candidates are 
likely to announce their candidacy in the following 
competing slates by week's end: 
 
-- NATIONAL CONSENSUS FRONT: This grouping will 
include the Iraqi Islamic Party, Sunni Conference, 
Sunni Waqf, and several National Dialogue Council 
leaders.  The list mixes extreme Islamists like the 
Dialogue Council's Abd al-Nasser al-Janabi with 
moderate Islamists like former Waqf Director Adnan al- 
Duleimi.  It also mixes moderates who deeply opposed 
the Ba'ath regime like Ayad Samarai with tribal 
shaykhs who were considered Saddam allies like Khalaf 
al-Ayan.  It even includes a few secularists, such as 
Deputy Prime Minister Abid Mutlak al-Jaburi who says 
in private that he dislikes Islamist influence in the 
government.  The list will probably attempt to promote 
itself as the best moderate option to Sunni Arab 
voters who want to ensure their sect is represented in 
national politics.  Candidates like al-Jaburi 
notwithstanding, it will also position itself as the 
slate with clearest Sunni Islamist identity. 
 
-- PATRIOTIC IRAQI LIST:  Allawi's coalition, which 
includes a host of Shia personalities, has drawn in 
several Sunni Arab leaders, among them Vice President 
Ghazi al-Yawar, former TNA Speaker Hachim al-Hasani, 
Republican Gathering leader Sa'ad al-Janabi and 
Minister of State for Provincial Affairs Shaykh Saad 
Hardan.  Here, too, the Sunni Arab candidates each 
represent a competing trend of politics.  Yawar and 
Hardan are tribal shaykhs with traditional 
inclinations and no deep political ideology.  Hasani 
is a westernized former-Islamist with strong liberal 
tendencies.  Janabi, meanwhile, is a former Ba'ath 
apparatchik who fled the country with Husayn Kamil. 
Their shared calculation, and likely shared message, 
is that their list offers the best ticket to national 
unity in a political system threatened by sectarian 
discord.  These three Sunni Arabs are also among the 
most pro-American of any in the Sunni Arab community 
(Hasani is an American citizen.) 
 
-- IRAQI NATIONAL FRONT: The name of this group could 
still change, but it appears that several groups have 
signed on to the slate.  They include National 
Dialogue figures Salah al-Mutlak and Hasan Zaydan al- 
Luheibi, United Iraqi Congress leader Anwar al-Nada 
al-Luheibi, and Iraqi National Movement leader Hatem 
al-Mukhlis.  This list, perhaps more than any other, 
appears riven by differences.  Mukhlis told PolOff 
confidentially October 25 that his decision to 
 
SIPDIS 
cooperate with Mutlak is purely financial.  "An ocean 
separates his views and mine," he said.  The list 
makes an odd marriage between unrepentant Ba'athists 
like Mutlak and Hasan Zaydan, a former Iraqi Army 
general, and moderate figures who consider themselves 
victims of the Ba'ath regime, like Mukhlis.  The list 
also joins purely nationalist figures with tribal 
politicians.  Mukhlis acknowledged to PolOff that he 
had far more in common with Allawi and even the Iraqi 
Islamic Party but did not see any way to run with 
them.  Mutlak's loud voice is likely to cast this list 
as a nationalist, neo-Ba'ath slate with the clearest 
resistance credentials.  He has already promoted 
himself as the leader of the resistance's "political 
wing."  Mukhlis, whose father was murdered by the 
Ba'athists, and Anwar al-Nada, a reflexive anti- 
Ba'athist, are both repelled by that message but 
expect it to emerge nevertheless.  Mukhlis said he 
doubts the alliance will hold together past Election 
Day. 
 
-- NATION RECONCILIATION AND LIBERATION FRONT:  TNA 
Member Mish'an Jaburi, one of the few Sunni Arabs to 
independently win a seat in the last assembly, 
insisted on running his own slate in this election. 
In the process, he rebuffed several Sunni Arab leaders 
who sought an alliance but were unwilling to declare 
fealty to him.  Jaburi has been able to hold out and 
run alone because he is reportedly wealthy from 
lucrative business ties to the former regime (and, 
many say, cash from Kurdish leader Masud Barzani).  He 
is also well positioned for self-promotion with 6 
seats on the Salah al-Din Provincial Council, his own 
newspaper, and a satellite station in the works. 
Jaburi is likely to run as a maverick, offering a 
third-way for Sunni Arabs uninterested in Ba'athists 
or Islamists. 
 
-- NUMEROUS INDEPENDENT SLATES LIKELY:  There are 
indications that a host of Sunni Arab personalities 
whose egos outsize their popularity will also run 
independent slates.  Former Anbar Governor and tribal 
Shaykh Fasal Gaoud insisted to PolOff on October 25 
that he would run a list in every governorate under 
the name the Iraqi Solidarity Council.  Samara Shaky 
Tawas al-Jabr, who rode the coattails of the Shia 
coalition to a seat in the National Assembly, is 
reportedly pushing his own coalition in Nine.  Iraqi 
National Gathering leader Hussein Jaburi, whose party 
holds three seats in Salah al-Din's council, is not 
reported to have allied with any larger coalition.  A 
host of other names are sure to emerge when the lists 
are made public next week. 
 
Satterfield