Iran Press/ Middle East: With opposition parties weak, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) are likely to extend their almost three decades of sharing power.Splits within the PUK present the possibility that Masoud Barzani’s KDP will take a dominant position in Kurdish politics, both in the regional centre, Irbil and in the difficult formation of a federal government in Baghdad.
The PUK and the Irbil-based Barzani’s KDP together form a duopoly. But years of corruption, and unpaid salaries of civil servants have undermined faith in politics and shrunk the turnout in recent elections.
There are 111-seats up for grabs in Sunday’s local parliamentary election, including 11 seats reserved for ethnic minorities.But most major parties say they do not expect more than about 40 - 50 percent of the 3.85 million registered voters to go to the polls. Polls will close at 6pm on Sunday according to local time and preliminary results are expected within 72 hours.
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