Iraq expected to certify election results Thursday
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-02-17 15:51

Iraq's electoral commission is expected to certify results from the country's Jan. 30 elections and allocate seats Thursday for the new 275-member National Assembly, officials said.

Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, the Shiite alliance's leader, walks out of his office past a painting showing his older brother and his brother's followers before he was assassinated in Najaf by a car bomb in 2003, in Baghdad, Iraq Wednesday, Feb. 16, 2005. [AP]

Electoral Commission official Adel al-Lami said the results would be announced at a press conference in Baghdad.

"Today we are going to certify the election results and declare the names of the winners and the seats each slate got," al-Lami said Thursday.

The commission first announced results from the ballot Sunday, saying the clergy-backed United Iraqi Alliance scooped 48 percent of the vote for the National Assembly, the Kurdish alliance took 26 percent and Allawi, a secular Shiite who supported strong ties to Washington, won only 14 percent.

A deadline to file complaints expired Wednesday.

Once the results are certified, the present government must set a timetable for installing the new government. There have been no indications on how long that might take, and will depend on back-room dealmaking among the parties.

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