Hope v/s choas Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani meeting with aides Thursday in the holy city of Najaf, urged his followers to vote "yes" on the new basic law,
Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani v/s Muqtada al-Sadr and Ayatollah Mohammed al-Yaqoubi..
It is Iraqi hopes v/s Iranian backed choas..for the background..the famous Najaf Qom confrontation.. schism within the shiite Islam..
iranian.com
Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani meeting with aides Thursday in the holy city of Najaf, urged his followers to vote "yes" on the new basic law, according to two top officials in al-Sistani's organization. The officials refused to be identified because they are not authorized to speak for the reclusive cleric.
In January, millions of Shiites followed al-Sistani's call to vote in Iraq's first democratic elections in nearly half a century, and the ballot gave the Muslim sect a majority in the new parliament and government.
If two-thirds of the voters in any three of Iraq's 18 provinces reject the constitution during the Oct. 15 national referendum, a new government must be formed and the process of writing the document would start again.
Most Sunni Muslim clerics and politicians have urged their followers to vote against the document, complaining that they did not have adequate representation in drafting it. Sunnis, the favored group under Saddam, account for an estimated 20 percent of the population and form the majority in four provinces.
Two other popular leaders in Iraq's majority Shiite sect, Muqtada al-Sadr and Ayatollah Mohammed al-Yaqoubi, also have rejected the constitution, and their stand — representing a potentially serious rift in the Shiite monolith — has been reflected recent violence in the southern city of Basra. |
