IRAQ: Arab media did not take an optimistic view of the future of Iraq following the expected adoption of the constitution in Saturday's referendum.
The pan-Arab daily Al-Hayat observed that the reported strong Yes vote in the Sunni majority province of Ninevah contrasted sharply with the high Sunni No vote in Salahuddin and Anbar.
This sparked suspicion that election officials had been overzealous in stuffing boxes with Yes ballots in order to deprive the Sunnis of a third province where two-thirds of voters rejected and defeated it.
Commentators warned that Sunni opposition to the US and the government is likely to grow if Sunnis believe the referendum result was rigged. Writing in the popular Jordanian daily Al-Dastour, Muhammad Naji al-Amaryeh said that although the referendum went smoothly, the wrangling over the constitution showed that there is no national consensus.
"The constitution will not end the current state of chaos, drive out the occupation forces, or stop terrorist operations," he predicted.
The Saudi daily Arab News said in an editorial that "an Iraq with a constitution is just as chaotic as an Iraq without", but concluded that "a democratically agreed-on constitution is better than none at all."
However, Abdullah al-Ashaal, a former senior foreign ministry official commenting in Egypt's Al-Ahram Weekly, said that unless the constitution is amended to strengthen the central authorities and ensure Iraq's Arab identity, the federal policy laid down in the document could very easily divide the country even further.
The Jordan Times looked to what could happen now that the referendum is over. It said that Shias and Kurds should not continue to marginalise the Sunnis and hoped Sunni participation in the referendum would promote "national reconciliation."
The Gulf Today, a liberal daily published in the United Emirates, questioned whether Shias, Kurds and Sunnis would ever reach agreement if and when the constitution comes up for amendment.
The paper predicts that the "referendum and its results [ will] fade into irrelevance".
Beirut's Daily Star took the view that "it is an appropriate time for the Americans to reassess their military and political strategies in the country - particularly those strategies that have provoked so much Sunni anger and hostility."
But the paper warned that the US should not cut and run - as it did in Afghanistan - as soon as a new full-term parliament and government are installed next year.
"Scaling down the goal of a peaceful, stable, democratic state should not be an option" as this would transform Iraq into a haven of extremism and invite "another September 11-style disaster".
