ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - An official from Kirkuk’s Turkmen Front said on Sunday that the position of the disputed province’s governor should be rotated between the city's components, adding that election results do not influence the distribution of administrative posts or the political future of the city.
Qahtan al-Wandawi, the Kirkuk head of the Iraqi Turkmen Front, told Rudaw on Sunday that following December’s provincial elections, his party has had rounds of negotiations with Arab and Kurdish parties in order to come to an agreement over the distribution of posts in the province.
“From the very first day, we initiated that the governor's post should be held in rotation among the three communities, which is the best solution,” he said.
Kirkuk saw the highest turnout across Iraq for provincial elections on December 18, with 65 percent of eligible voters casting ballots. This was the first time since 2005 that Kirkuk held provincial elections.
The Turkmen Front received over 75,000 votes, securing two spots on the 16-seat council.
Kurdish parties won seven seats - five to the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and two to the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP). A coalition of three Arab parties won six seats. The minority Christian quota seat was taken by a candidate close to pro-Iran Shiite militia groups and the PUK.
Since the fall of the Ba’athist regime in 2003, Kurds and Arabs have dominated the top post. The governor was a Kurd until October 2017 when the federal forces returned to the province after the Kurdistan Region’s independence referendum and appointed a Sunni as acting governor.
Wandawi said that it is time for the Turkmen to hold the post of governor, despite their achievement in the poll.
“The Turkmen have been deprived of this post for 100 years. There are 18 provinces in Iraq. There is not a single Turkmen governor,” Wandawi said, adding that the result of the election does not affect the distribution of administrative positions in Kirkuk because of the province’s “special situation.”
Two amendments made to the provincial council elections law in May, which apply only to Kirkuk, make it difficult to predict who will fill the province’s governor seat next.
One amendment states that “the results of the elections shall not act as a legal or administrative basis to determine the future of Kirkuk province.”
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