IRAQ THE MODEL

I'm watching Al-Iraqia TV now, waiting for news about the 2nd session for the national assembly.
The session was supposed to be held by noon (35 minutes ago) but till now nothing has happened and 5 minutes ago, one of the members from the Coalition list stated that there are still discussions among the Sunni members of the Assembly for choosing someone to be nominated for heading the National Assembly.
This, will (as came in the statement) probably force postponing the session until Saturday.
Yesterday, Ghazi Al-Yawir, the interim Iraqi president refused being nominated for the same position.

More updates, soon.

1st update:

Muhsin Nayif Al-Jarba (one of the current nominees for heading the assembly) announced that he prefers to reach an agreement regarding this subject today.

"The complaints and anxiety on the streets have reached a high level from the successive delays especially after the extreme security precautions that have been taken in Baghdad for more than 24 hours now. People have waited this moment for a very long time and we can't keep them waiting anymore"

These precautions that almost paralyzed life in the city are adopted in an attempt to provide enough safety for the meeting of the Assembly; armored vehicles of the Iraqi Army are seen for the 1st time in large numbers on the streets of Baghdad and all the bridges but one are closed since yesterday.

Mr. Al-Jarba added
"we're ready to keep the discussions running until we reach an agreement even if this takes all day because this is much better than another postponement"

he also stressed that the person to be chosen for occupying this position is preferred to be agreed on through accord before a voting is carried out.


2nd update 1:20 pm

The 275 members are entering the conference hall in the convention center right now.
Al-Iraqia reporter mentioned that apparantely all the members are going to attend the meeting.

This gives an indication that an agreemnet was reached.... hopefully

3rd update 1:35 pm

The talks are preceeded by reading a few verses from the Quran; versess that call to unity were chosen.
Allawi and Yawir were the last member to enter the hall, it seems that they were having some last-minute talks with other major members in a neighboring hall.

4th:

The major masses in the assembly have declared their desire to cancel the currently held session until the Sunni mass agrees on a person for heading the Assembly.

A female member stood up and strongly criticized this suggestion. She demanded that the iraqi people be informed about what's going on:

"this mysteriousness need to be ended, I consider any further delay without informing the people about what really is going on a an act of betrayal. I demand full transperancy".

5th and maybe the last!

The chairman has just asked the press to leave the conference hall saying that a closed session is going to take place.

6th:

Well, this is going to be the last update for today with the final results for today's meeting of the National Assembly.

The latest news here (actually about 90 minutes ago) confirmed that no agreement was reached on whom to nominate for chairman position in the National Assembly after the Sunni members failed in reaching an agreement among themselves about this subject. Therefore, this decision will be discussed later in the 3rd meeting of the Assembly next Sunday. This is going to be the final chance for the 17 Sunni members to make up their mind and name one candidate they support.
Again, if they failed to do so by Sunday, there will be an open vote to choose a person for the position in question from whatever number of Sunni members who would like to run for this position.

I expect that Iraqis will feel a little bit disappointed by the outcome of today's session and frankly speaking, I feel that way too but there's nothing to do except waiting and hoping for the best to happen.