By NNN-KUNA
Baghdad : Muqtada Al-Sadr, leader of the Sadrist Movement, has decided to boycott the political process in Iraq, a leader in the movement’s political council said on Saturday.
Addressing a press conference near Al-Ferdos Square where Saddam Hussein’s statue was toppled more than three years ago, Ahmed Al-Sherifi said he was mandated by Al-Sadr to announce the boycott.
Consequently, the Sadrists have withdrawn support to the legislative and executive powers in the country. The Sadrist MPs, thus, are no longer representatives of the movement.
Revealing that the “political council” recently formed will manage the movement, Al-Sherifi accused the Sadrist as well other MPs in the Iraqi National Assembly (parliament) of being “driven by greed and that they exploited the simplicity of the Iraqi people and tampered with their interests.
“Based on these findings, we have decided to boycott the political process and withdraw our support to the legislative and executive powers.
“As for the Sadrist Bloc … it no longer represents our political will,” he said, noting that the movement’s “honest sons” represented it.
In his answer to a question from KUNA, Al-Sherifi said that withdrawing confidence was a matter decided “today” (Aug 11). In the past we withdrew our representatives from the executive power and today we proceed to withdraw from the legislative power,” he said.
According to Al-Sherifi, the political process in Iraq “veered off course and has not achieved the aspired goals.” He stressed that “there are two ways for the reform of the political process: early elections or forming an emergency government.” The Sadrist Bloc has 30 MPs and it is part of the Iraqi Alliance that has 115 MPs.
Back in February, Muqtada Al-Sadr demanded that his Bloc’s six members in the government withdraw from their posts, offering Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki the freedom to choose others — non-partisan or technocrat – to replace them.