Baghdad — Although Iraq’s higher authorities affirmed that early elections are to be held in early summer, the High Electoral Commission is unable to sit for the ballot on the scheduled date, which prompted the council of ministers to approve Jan. 19 the commission’s request to delay the voting until October.

In a joint meeting Jan. 13, and in the presence of Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Iraq Jeanine Plasschaert and members of the commission, Iraq’s three presidencies — the president, prime minister and parliament speaker — stressed the need to take all measures and make the preparations for early elections, so as to ensure the utmost credible outcomes.

Once he took office seven months ago, Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi pledged to hold early elections as the protesters demanded and Iraq’s top Shiite cleric Ali al-Sistani backed as well.

Now that the government allocated the funding for the elections and provided the commission with the necessary support, particularly to update the voters registration system, the ball is seemingly in the court of the parliament and the political blocs in order for them to do their part of the work relating to early elections, i.e., to complete the law relating to the federal court, which is in charge of approving the elections’ results, and vote to dissolve parliament, which is the sole constitutional way to organize elections ahead of time. However, do these blocs agree on a date to dissolve the parliament?