thedrifter
10-16-05, 05:53 AM
October 15, 2005
Iraq referendum draws few voters in Ramadi; more in Fallujah
By Gordon Trowbridge
Times staff writer
RAMADI, Iraq — A rush to join Iraq’s fledgling democratic process, hoped for and predicted by U.S. officials, failed to materialize here on Saturday, as voters in this violence-plagued provincial capital largely stayed home during Iraq’s constitutional referendum.
Elsewhere in the crucial Sunni Triangle, however, voter turnout appeared to be more encouraging.
Capt. Patrick Kerr, a spokesman for 2nd Marine Division at Camp Blue Diamond in Ramadi, said turnout was significantly higher in other parts of the province. An early report had turnout at about 60 percent of eligible voters in Fallujah, he said.
In the operations center of 3rd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, which patrols about two-thirds of Ramadi, Marine officers were unsure whether insurgent threats, scattered violence as Election Day opened or Sunni Muslim rejection of the U.S.-led political process was to blame.
But there was clearly disappointment that predictions of significant voter turnout, fed by pledges from many residents to vote in hopes of defeating the draft constitution, proved too optimistic.
The Marine unit’s early estimates put total turnout at the eight Ramadi precincts in its sector at about 2,000. That number included about 700 votes by Iraqi soldiers based in the city, and an unknown number from election workers.
At one precinct, in a neighborhood where U.S. forces regularly come under fire, a single resident voted.
Some Sunni politicians had pledged an attempt to defeat the draft by a 2-to-1 margin in three of the nation’s provinces, which would have defeated the document even if a majority of residents nationwide had voted to approve it.
But Marines here got their first hint at Saturday’s events on Friday, when the city’s religious leaders failed to instruct their congregations to vote, as U.S. commanders had hoped they would. Some of the city’s mosques broadcast general messages about the holy month of Ramadan, while other preachers told worshipers not to vote and to continue resistance against the U.S.-led political process.
Ramadi is among Iraq’s most dangerous cities. The capital of Anbar province, a Utah-sized territory stretching from just west of Baghdad to the Syrian and Jordanian borders, the city is a hotbed of activity by foreign terrorists tied to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, by Sunni Muslims resisting their Shiite rivals’ newfound power, and by loyalists to the deposed Saddam Hussein.
The unit had prepared for as many as 40,000 voters, said Lt. Col. Roger Turner, the battalion’s commander.
Concerned that the presence of U.S. troops might discourage residents from leaving their homes, Turner said that by mid-afternoon he had pulled back most combat patrols and kept U.S. aircraft away from the area in hopes of bringing out voters.
Marine patrols had repeatedly heard from city residents that they planned to vote, and vote against the proposed constitution, which was opposed by many Sunni politicians and religious leaders. Marines from top generals to young lance corporals had expressed optimism that increased participation by the city’s Sunni Muslim majority would signal a turn away from violence and toward the political process.
Turnout in Anbar during January’s parliamentary elections was sparse; as a result, the Shiites and Kurds took control of the constitutional process. The top Marine commander in Iraq said before Saturday’s vote that he believed Anbar’s voters would not want to be left out again.
“I think they’ll fall out and vote,” said Maj. Gen. Stephen Johnson, the commander of Marine forces in Iraq, a week before the referendum. “Even if they vote no, it will show they have a stake in the process.”
But in Ramadi, Marine officers said it might take days to assess just why residents stayed home.
“It’s either fear and intimidation by the enemy at work, or maybe the changes made [to the constitution] in the last few days make it close enough, and they’re ready to move on to December,” Turner said.
Violence was far less than what the battalion had seen in recent weeks. In the early afternoon, two polling sites in the dangerous southern portion of the city received what Turner described as sporadic small-arms and mortar or rocket fire, causing minor injuries to one civilian poll worker and two Iraqi soldiers.
Shortly after polls opened, insurgents had attacked the Anbar provincial government center with rocket-propelled grenades and small-arms fire, the sound of the blasts echoing across the city. The center, a regular target of insurgents, was not a polling site. There were no injuries in that attack.
Ellie
Iraq referendum draws few voters in Ramadi; more in Fallujah
By Gordon Trowbridge
Times staff writer
RAMADI, Iraq — A rush to join Iraq’s fledgling democratic process, hoped for and predicted by U.S. officials, failed to materialize here on Saturday, as voters in this violence-plagued provincial capital largely stayed home during Iraq’s constitutional referendum.
Elsewhere in the crucial Sunni Triangle, however, voter turnout appeared to be more encouraging.
Capt. Patrick Kerr, a spokesman for 2nd Marine Division at Camp Blue Diamond in Ramadi, said turnout was significantly higher in other parts of the province. An early report had turnout at about 60 percent of eligible voters in Fallujah, he said.
In the operations center of 3rd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, which patrols about two-thirds of Ramadi, Marine officers were unsure whether insurgent threats, scattered violence as Election Day opened or Sunni Muslim rejection of the U.S.-led political process was to blame.
But there was clearly disappointment that predictions of significant voter turnout, fed by pledges from many residents to vote in hopes of defeating the draft constitution, proved too optimistic.
The Marine unit’s early estimates put total turnout at the eight Ramadi precincts in its sector at about 2,000. That number included about 700 votes by Iraqi soldiers based in the city, and an unknown number from election workers.
At one precinct, in a neighborhood where U.S. forces regularly come under fire, a single resident voted.
Some Sunni politicians had pledged an attempt to defeat the draft by a 2-to-1 margin in three of the nation’s provinces, which would have defeated the document even if a majority of residents nationwide had voted to approve it.
But Marines here got their first hint at Saturday’s events on Friday, when the city’s religious leaders failed to instruct their congregations to vote, as U.S. commanders had hoped they would. Some of the city’s mosques broadcast general messages about the holy month of Ramadan, while other preachers told worshipers not to vote and to continue resistance against the U.S.-led political process.
Ramadi is among Iraq’s most dangerous cities. The capital of Anbar province, a Utah-sized territory stretching from just west of Baghdad to the Syrian and Jordanian borders, the city is a hotbed of activity by foreign terrorists tied to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, by Sunni Muslims resisting their Shiite rivals’ newfound power, and by loyalists to the deposed Saddam Hussein.
The unit had prepared for as many as 40,000 voters, said Lt. Col. Roger Turner, the battalion’s commander.
Concerned that the presence of U.S. troops might discourage residents from leaving their homes, Turner said that by mid-afternoon he had pulled back most combat patrols and kept U.S. aircraft away from the area in hopes of bringing out voters.
Marine patrols had repeatedly heard from city residents that they planned to vote, and vote against the proposed constitution, which was opposed by many Sunni politicians and religious leaders. Marines from top generals to young lance corporals had expressed optimism that increased participation by the city’s Sunni Muslim majority would signal a turn away from violence and toward the political process.
Turnout in Anbar during January’s parliamentary elections was sparse; as a result, the Shiites and Kurds took control of the constitutional process. The top Marine commander in Iraq said before Saturday’s vote that he believed Anbar’s voters would not want to be left out again.
“I think they’ll fall out and vote,” said Maj. Gen. Stephen Johnson, the commander of Marine forces in Iraq, a week before the referendum. “Even if they vote no, it will show they have a stake in the process.”
But in Ramadi, Marine officers said it might take days to assess just why residents stayed home.
“It’s either fear and intimidation by the enemy at work, or maybe the changes made [to the constitution] in the last few days make it close enough, and they’re ready to move on to December,” Turner said.
Violence was far less than what the battalion had seen in recent weeks. In the early afternoon, two polling sites in the dangerous southern portion of the city received what Turner described as sporadic small-arms and mortar or rocket fire, causing minor injuries to one civilian poll worker and two Iraqi soldiers.
Shortly after polls opened, insurgents had attacked the Anbar provincial government center with rocket-propelled grenades and small-arms fire, the sound of the blasts echoing across the city. The center, a regular target of insurgents, was not a polling site. There were no injuries in that attack.
Ellie