All eyes on 'tough man' Allawi

Interim President Iyad Allawi could be the political leader with the fewest enemies in Iraq. Picture / Reuters

BAGHDAD - His avuncular face stares from posters across Baghdad. One plastered across a window at the Yarmouk hospital also has smaller pictures of a religious dignitary and a woman wearing a headscarf.

Iyad Allawi, the Iraqi interim Prime Minister, is appealing to voters as a strong man who brings order to his war-ravaged country. The presence of the cleric and woman on the poster are designed to show that he is a secular candidate but still has religious supporters.

Three young men were lolling by the door of the hospital. They said they wanted to vote - "it is our religious duty" - but went on to explain that "we live in Dohra, a very dangerous district and maybe we will not dare to go to the polls".

Allawi's Iraqi List, including his own party, the Iraqi National Accord, is expected to be one of the three main victors in the election on Sunday. The other two slates likely to do well are the United Iraqi Alliance combining the main Shiite parties, and the Kurdistan Alliance list.

It is surprising that Allawi is doing so well. In the six months since he was appointed interim Prime Minister by the US, Iraq has sunk ever deeper into war and economic misery. Even in the al-Rashid hotel in the heavily fortified Green Zone, water was rationed to one hour a day last week.

Iraq has the second-largest oil reserves in the world but petrol station queues in the country often back up several kilometres.

Even the mobile phones, one of the few popular innovations since the fall of Saddam Hussein, now often fail to work for hours at a time.

Nor is the military situation much better. Allawi supported the US assault on Fallujah last November but the insurgents showed they could switch attacks to other targets and for several days captured much of the northern capital of Mosul.

The pressure group Human Rights Watch has alleged that Iraqi security forces have been carrying out widespread torture, while US and British officials turned a blind eye. Police and soldiers, trained by the occupying powers, routinely mistreat detainees, including children.

The group's report said Allawi's Government had flouted the very principles used to justify the overthrow of Saddam Hussein.

"Iraqi Interim Government officials have stated on many occasions that tough measures to bring the security situation under control would remain consistent with international human rights standards.

"The findings show otherwise and tolerance of abuse of detainees by Government agencies remains high."

But through all these disasters Allawi exudes a jovial confidence that Iraq is on the mend, its new army is in the making and soon "evil forces will be driven from Iraq".

Last September he stood beside US President George W. Bush to announce that 14 or 15 out of 18 Iraqi provinces were "completely safe". Iraqis know only the three Kurdish provinces are safe but the statement has not damaged him.

Allawi's main card remains the support he receives from the US. He depends on its 150,000 soldiers. The very fact that an election is taking place at the end of this week is primarily an American decision.

But he is not wholly without leverage because the US, without any real idea of how it is going to extract itself from the Iraqi morass, would prefer Allawi to the alternatives.

The election may deliver a photocopy of the present Government, with Allawi reappointed as Prime Minister. This would probably satisfy two of the most important players in Iraqi politics - the Americans and the Kurds - and would be acceptable to many Shiite leaders.

Allawi's political success in the eyes of Iraqi voters is not based on his achievements, but he plays up to their desire for a strong man who will bring security back into Iraqi lives. He comes from a prominent Shiite merchant family but at college in Baghdad in the late 1960s he was a militant member of the Baath Party.

He remained a Baathist as a student leader in Britain in the 1970s but later quarrelled with Saddam, whose agents almost succeeded in murdering him. He was supported first by MI6 and later by the CIA.

His party looked to former Baathist officials and soldiers for its membership though Allawi's one attempt at a military coup in Iraq in 1966 failed disastrously.

If he does well in the elections it will be because he is a former Baathist but not close to Saddam.

This is true of a lot of Iraqis, particularly in Government.

He is a secular Shiite and many Shiites do not want to vote for the United Iraqi List, dominated by religious parties.

His secular and Baathist background may also make him acceptable to some Sunni Arabs. Amid the ferocious divisions of Iraqi politics, Allawi could turn out to be the man with the fewest enemies.

- INDEPENDENT