Who are the key candidates and party alliances in the elections?
On March 7, Iraqis will go to the polls to elect their national assembly for the second time. It is an election that is hotly contested among 6,172 political candidates for only 325 seats. The vote is unlikely to produce decisive results and will likely lead to a prolonged period of bargaining as the winning alliances struggle to form a new coalition government. The situation is extremely confusing concerning the party alliances. There are six key party alliances, but it is extremely likely that they will break up and reconfigure after the elections. State of Law is the embodiment of Maliki’s strategy of recasting himself as a secular and nationalist leader. While Maliki has enticed some individuals and relatively small Sunni and Kurdish organizations to join the alliance, he has not attracted the major personalities and groups necessary to give the coalition a truly non-sectarian character. As a result, the coalition appears lopsided and dominated by Maliki himself. The Iraqi National
