Iraq election commission disqualifies 187 candidates ahead of November poll

BAGHDAD — The Independent High Electoral Commission has disqualified 187 candidates from the November 11 elections over legal and eligibility concerns, Head of the Media Team Imad Jamil said in an interview with Al-Rabiaa TV.

According to Jamil, the main grounds for disqualification fall under Article 7(3) of Election Law No. 12 of 2018, covering conduct, behavior, administrative and financial corruption, and misdemeanors involving moral turpitude. Some candidates were also excluded for forging academic certificates, with the Commission awaiting further responses from the Ministry of Education.

Jamil said there are 7,888 candidates in total, and additional lists will come from the Accountability and Justice Commission, the Integrity Commission, the Ministry of Education, and other entities. “If candidates are reinstated after an appeal, the Commission will comply with their return as candidates, and we will continue the verification process until September,” he said.

Some excerpts of Jamil’s interview on Al-Rabiaa TV:

The Commission excluded and replaced around 97 candidates for failing to meet candidacy requirements before we sent the final list of names for verification.

We began receiving responses from the Ministry of Interior’s Criminal Registration Directorate indicating that there are certain criminal records concerning some candidates. I also noted today that the Board of Commissioners issued a decision to exclude 65 candidates, and another decision to exclude 25 more. Once these exclusions are published on the Commission’s website, affected individuals have the right to file an appeal with the judicial body within three days of the issuance or publication of these decisions on the website.

This matter is not within the Commission’s discretion; the Commission only sends the names, and the responses come back with either exclusion or approval.

Anyone who has been granted a pardon is not allowed to run in the elections.

The main grounds for excluding candidates are set out in Article 7(3) of Election Law No. 12 of 2018, which relates to conduct, behavior, administrative and financial corruption, and misdemeanors involving moral turpitude.

We have excluded some candidates who forged their academic certificates, and we are awaiting responses from the Ministry of Education.

The Commission enforces decisions received from the relevant authorities and adheres to their responses, while exclusion decisions are issued by the judicial body and are binding on the Commission.

There are 7,888 candidates in total, a number that requires time to process. In the next stage, we will receive names from the Accountability and Justice Commission, the Ministry of Education, the Integrity Commission, the Ministry of Education, and other entities.

We are focused on the present and want to make improvements—do not take us back to the past and then ask why these names were not excluded previously.

If candidates are reinstated after an appeal, the Commission will comply with their return as candidates, and we will continue the verification process until September.