BAGHDAD - Iraq's National Assembly is set to elect its speaker, two speaker deputies, and the next Iraqi presidential board, comprising a president and two vice presidents, and announce the Assembly's bylaws on its session on Tuesday.
Sheikh Dhari Al-Fayyad, the Assembly's oldest member, will preside the session that will be held tomorrow amid speculations that Fawaz Al-Jerba will be elected speaker and Hussein Al-Shahrestani will be elected deputy house speaker.
Debates are underway to select a Kurdish for the second deputy house speaker position.
The Shiite United Iraqi Alliance (UIA) has stressed in a statement to the press today the importance of electing a speaker, two deputy speakers for the Assembly in order to pave the way for naming the next president and his two vice presidents and the prime minister.
Out-going interim Iraqi President Sheikh Ghazi Al-Yawar has reportedly rejected an offer to become speaker for the National Assembly, amid confirmations that the UIA would select Jerba for the post.
Hyder Al-Mosawi, spokesman for the Ahmad Chalabi-led Iraqi National Congress, which is also one of the major components of the UIA, told Kuwait News Agency (KUNA) that Jerba, a prominent leader of the Shimmar tribe, would get the position. He added that either Nori Sawish or Fouad Massoum would be selected as deputy speaker along with Hussein Al-Shahrestani.
Political sources have reported that Adel Abdul-Mahdi was one of the strongest candidates for the vice Iraqi president post, a Sunni personality is expected to become the second Iraqi vice president, most likely to be the outgoing president Sheikh Ghazi Al-Yawar. The second vice president position is swinging, according to sources, between the two Kurdish leaders: Masoud Barazani and Jalal Talabani.
KUNA