Ability to unify Iraq is Al-Jaafari's ace
Former physician wins prime ministerial nomination
(CNN) -- With an endorsement from Iraqis who participated in last month's election, the Shiite-backed United Iraqi Alliance won the right to nominate the country's next prime minister.
And Tuesday, that political party announced that its push for cohesiveness had bumped Ahmad Chalabi from his top contender spot.
Instead, the alliance tapped Ibrahim al-Jaafari, a trained physician, to lead the country.
Chalabi, long a controversial figure in the Iraqi conflict, was a key source of Pentagon intelligence that former dictator Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. Dogged searches for such weapons haven't located any.
His political record during the years he spent in exile in Iran and London, suggests he has the capacity to unify disparate elements.
And that ability could be crucial in avoiding civil war and maintaining peace among Shiites, Kurds and Sunnis.
Al-Jaafari, 58, has indicated that he wants Iraq's new government to be diverse. "I think we have to involve them in government," al-Jaafari said last week.
"I can't imagine a government without Sunni, Shiite and Kurd because all these are main components of our society."
Al-Jaafari also has espoused the non-traditional, but inclusive idea, that women be involved in governing the country.
An April 2004 opinion poll by the Iraq Center for Research and Strategic Studies found that Iraqis ranked al-Jaafari the third most popular public figure in Iraq, after Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani and Moqtada al-Sadr.
The recognition could be from the former exile's political involvement, which spans decades. He is the deputy president of the Iraqi Interim Government but his political involvement began in 1966 when he joined the Dawa Party.
That group, among the country's oldest and most popular political organizations, favors establishing an Islamic state in Iraq.
But recent interviews indicate that al-Jaafari is not planning to turn Iraq into a state governed solely by Islamic law.
When Saddam Hussein began cracking down on Islamic Shiites in 1980, al-Jaafari fled to Iran, then to Britain in 1989.
His wife, who is a surgeon, and his five children live in the United Kingdom.
Al-Jaafari returned to Iraq after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion. In August of that year, he became a member of the Iraqi Governing Council and served as the first of the Council's rotating chairman.
