Gov’t urges Samarraie to speed up passage of laws

BAGHDAD / IraqiNews.com: An Iraqi government spokesperson on Monday said that it welcomes Iyad al-Samarraie’s election as Parliament speaker, calling to speed up the passage of laws and legislative items. “The government wishes Samarraie all success in his post as Speaker…,” Spokesperson Ali al-Dabbagh said in a statement that was received by IraqiNews.com news agency. Yesterday, the vote counting to elect a speaker ended with Samarraie winning the post with 155 votes. Samarraie, who won the majority of votes, was born in 1946 in the city of Samarra, Salah al-Din province. Samarraie is descending from a renowned family. His father used to be the military attaché in an Arab country before receiving a death sentence and was executed in the 1970s. Samarraie was also a member of the Iraqi Islamic Party (IIP). He climbed up the partisan ladder in Iraq and was tracked down by the former regime in 1980. He received a death sentence and had to leave Iraq for neighboring Jordan, later to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and then to the United Kingdom (UK), where he re-established the IIP. SS (P) 1