LIVE: Parliamentary session to elect new Kurdistan Region President begins
ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The Kurdistan Region’s Parliament on Tuesday morning, 11:00 am local time, opened its highly-anticipated session to elect the new President of the autonomous region.
Five candidates have been presented or nominated for the key executive post.
The candidates to the presidency are incumbent Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani, Umed Abdulsalam Qadir, Mohammed Hama-Salih Omar, Rebwar Aziz Mustafa, and Hiwa Abdullah Khidir.
In November 2017, then-President Masoud Barzani announced he would end his already-extended term in the aftermath of the referendum on independence and as Kurdish parties failed to agree on a date for regional elections. Since then, the Kurdistan Region Presidency has been suspended and powers of the president have been delegated to the prime minister, parliamentary speaker, and the regional judiciary.
On May 8, lawmakers passed a draft bill entitled, “The Reactivation of the Office of the President of the Kurdistan Region – Iraq and Amending the Method of Electing the President till the Ratification of a Constitution.”
Key provisions in the new law outline how the president is to be elected. Until now, the position was determined directly by the people through a popular vote. The amendment, however, changed the mechanism, and instead hands the decision-making process to the parliament, where the winner must achieve a 50+1 majority.
Updates to follow...