Iraq's electoral commission affirmed on Sunday the narrow victory of a Sunni-backed bloc in the March vote after a partial recount undercut the Shiite prime minister's claims of fraud in the tally.
The result was a setback for Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who came in second to former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi by a small margin. But his alliance with another Shiite bloc still gives him a strong chance of holding on to power for another four years.
I'm glad the review of votes showed no fraud. That's good on two scores. One, Allawi was not apparently robbed of the pole position. Even if he did win due to irregularities, it would look bad to reverse his narrow win. Ideally, Allawi gets the first shot at forming a government despite the Shia side agreement.
And two, the election itself was clean enough for government work. In the long run, the latter is most important.
Hopefully this paves the way for a government to form without too much delay.
