Ibraheim Al-Jaafari, the head of the pro-Iran Da’awa party gave an interview the other day. He tried very hard to pretend he was open-minded and that he wasn’t going to turn the once-secular Iraq into a fundamentalist Shia state but the fact of the matter remains that he is the head of the Da’awa party. The same party that was responsible for some of the most infamous explosions and assassinations in Iraq during the last few decades. This is the same party that calls for an Islamic Republic modeled like Iran. Most of its members have spent a substantial amount of time in Iran.
Jaffari cannot separate himself from the ideology of his party.
Then there’s Abdul Aziz Al-Hakim, head of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI). He got to be puppet president for the month of December and what was the first thing he did? He decided overburdened, indebted Iraq owed Iran 100 billion dollars. What was the second thing he did? He tried to have the “personal status” laws that protect individuals (and especially women) eradicated.
Riverbend from her blog Baghdad Burning

2/15/2004: The United Iraqi Alliance has agreed on Vice President Ibrahim Jaafari as its candidate for Prime Minister. Jaafari wants to bring Muqtada al-Sadr into the new government, but he is on record opposing the establishment of timetable for a US military withdrawal from Iraq. Adil Abdul Mahdi, the interim finance minister and representative of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, has withdrawn his name for consideration as prime minister. Abdul Mahdi's candidacy may have been damaged by his close working relationship with the Americans and his advocacy of privatizing the petroleum industry.
Jaafari: "Islam to be Source of Legislation" | Jaafari Takes lead | Iraqi groups demand US exit

2/14/2004: The United Iraqi Alliance (UIA) has won a majority (140 seats) after adjustments were made in accordance with electoral procedure. The UIA still needs a 2/3s majority, and therefore a coalition partner or partners, to form a government (which involves electing a president and two vice-presidents, who will appoint a prime minister). But it can now win votes on procedure and legislation without needing any other partner. Read More...

2/13/2005: Iraq's election results have been announced, but Iraq's future remains unclear. It appears that Iraqis have voted overwhelmingly to throw out the US-installed Ayad Allawi and a near majority have voted for the United Iraqi Alliance (UIA). The second plank in the UIA platform called for "a timetable for the withdrawal of the multinational forces from Iraq", but as with the UIA's other pledges to expand the public sector, keep the oil and drop the debt, this promise is unlikely to be kept if the US has its way and Iraq's current finance minister Adel Abdul al-Mahdi is chosen by the UIA to lead Iraq.

Election results were as follows:
8.55 million Iraqis, or 47% of eligible voters (58% of registered voters), cast ballots (including several hundred thousand voting from abroad).
The United Iraqi Alliance won 140 seats with more than 4 million votes, or about 48 percent of the total cast. The UIA's support was drawn largely from the Shiite political establishment and tacitly endorsed by Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. The UIA was headed by Abdel-Aziz al-Hakim, the cleric who heads Iraq's largest political group, the Shiite Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI). While al-Hakim headed the ticket, Adel Abdul al-Mahdi and Ibrahim al-Jaafari are seen by some as the most likely alliance members to be chosen as Prime Minister. The UIA included SCIRI, and the Islamic Dawa Party as well as Ahmed Chalabi's Iraqi National Congress (INC) and the Hezbollah Movement in Iraq.
The Kurdish Alliance List won 75 seats with 2.175 million votes, or 26 percent. Among the Kurdish Alliance List's 165 candidates's were the Kurdistan Democratic Party leader Massoud Barzani and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan leader Jalal Talabani.
The Iraqi List won 40 seats with 1.168 million votes, or 13.8 percent of the total. The Iraqi List was lead by interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi and his Iraqi National Accord party and included a mix of Shiites and Sunnis (but Shiites accounted for the majority of top names).
The Iraqis Party won 5 seats with 150,000 votes, or less than 2 percent. The Iraqi Party was led by interim President Ghazi al-Yawer and favored by some Sunnis who agreed with al-Yawer's opposition to U.S. attacks aimed at wiping out insurgents in the hotbed cities of Fallujah and Mosul.
The Assembly Of Independent Democrats won no seats with only 12,000 votes, or 0.1 percent. It ran 78 candidates and was led by the Sunni leader Adnan Pachachi. The Assembly Of Independent Democrats had been expected to fare well among intellectuals and the urban middle class. Before last year, Pachachi had been widely thought to be the most likely future Sunni leader of Iraq.
Other Parties: The Turkomen Iraqi Front (representing the country's ethnic Turks) got 3 seats with 93,480 votes, the National Independent Elites and Cadres Party got 3 seats with 69,938 votes, the Communist Party got 2 seats with 69,920 votes, the Islamic Kurdish Society got 2 seats with 60,592 votes, the Islamic Labor Movement got 2 seats with 43,205 votes, the National Democratic Alliance got one seat with 36,795 votes, the National Rafidain List (Assyrian Christians) got 1 seat with 36,255 votes, and the Reconciliation and Liberation Entity got 1 seat with 30,796 votes.

"Only 2 per cent of eligible Iraqis in the Sunni Arab-dominated Anbar province voted in Iraq's elections, and only 29 per cent in the mainly Sunni Salahadin province, the final tally released on Sunday showed. In Nineveh province, which has many Sunni Arabs as well as Kurds, turnout was 17 per cent. The figures showed that only 3,803 people voted in the whole of Anbar province. The low turnout in Sunni provinces showed that many Sunni Arabs boycotted the election or stayed away out of fear, which could worsen sectarian tension in Iraq and fuel the insurgency which is mainly waged by Sunni Arab guerrillas. If Sunnis are shut out of Iraq's next government, they could potentially veto a new constitution due to be drawn up this year, causing political deadlock."

In Kirkuk, The Kirkuk Brotherhood list of the two main Kurdish parties (the PUK and the KDP) -- won 58.4 percent of votes, or 237,303 out of 405,951 ballots cast. Turkey has urged Iraqi electoral officials and the UN to examine what it claims are skewed Iraqi elections results in Kirkuk. Iraq's Turkmen minority demonstrated in central Baghdad Sunday to protest alleged electoral fraud in the disputed northern oil city of Kirkuk during last month's historic election. The Kurds want Kirkuk to be added to the three autonomous provinces of Iraqi Kurdistan.

Sorry George, but Iraq has given you the purple finger | Shiites, Kurds, win Big: Bush Loses Election in Iraq | Khalid Jarrar On The Election