Race against time for Iraqi elections

By Caroline Hawley BBC correspondent in Baghdad

Iraq has faced a fresh wave of attacks by insurgents

The Americans are saying it, the British Government is saying it and so too is Iyad Allawi. Iraqis will go to the polls by the end of January, come what may.

The message is, elections may not be pretty, but they've been promised.

Unfortunately there's no magic wand to put Iraq right and the clock of course is ticking.

In less than four and a half months now Iraq's 25 million or so people should have taken part in a nationwide vote.

But we don't even know what the exact population of Iraq is. There's been no census done, there's no electoral register. That's one of the least of the problems here.

Insurgents

Six days ago, 50 people, mostly young men, were blown up in central Baghdad.

They'd been queuing up hoping to find work as policemen. Imagine what insurgents might do to crowds of would-be voters.

The UN Secretary General has said he doesn't see how credible elections can be held unless the security situation improves.

Still, he does have a tiny seven-person team in Baghdad, helping Iraq's electoral commission to prepare.

The UN officials are based in the heavily fortified green zone - a city within a city under American protection.

For them, as for other foreigners, it's too dangerous to venture far outside. There's the ever-present risk of kidnap.

Saddam Hussein won Iraq's last elections with 100% of the vote

So the role's limited to providing technical advice to Iraqi electoral officials and that's unlikely to change unless the security situation does, despite Iyad Allawi's call for more involvement from the UN.

Still the UN's electoral co-ordinator insists things are on track. The deadline is extremely tight, he told me, but not impossible.

Training's begun for electoral officials. A rough database of voters has now been set up, based on the names of Iraqis eligible for food rations under the former regime.

Votes

But the logistics of setting up the system is one thing, the safety of voters and candidates another.

And whole swathes of the country are outside the control of either the Americans or the interim Iraqi government.

Iyad Allawi has insisted the vote will be valid even if not everyone votes.

I remember the last time Iraqis went to the polls, just a few months before the war.

There was only one candidate, Saddam Hussein, up for another seven year term as president.

The ballot boxes were covered in bright pink wrapping paper in celebration.

Saddam's victory was of course guaranteed even before it all began - 100% of the vote it was in the end, with 100% turnout.

Iraqis want the freedom at last to cast a real ballot. The country's Shia majority, which was repressed under Saddam, is particularly keen.

They also need to know they'll be able to vote safely.

And Iraqi experts say elections have to be properly prepared and seen as legitimate if they're to help this country heal.