Iraq’s President to meet with his 1st Vice-President to know reason for latter’s resignation, official says

BAGHDAD / IraqiNews.com: Iraqi President Jalal Talabani is to meet with his 1 st Vice-President Adel Abdul-Mahdi to discuss the reasons for the latter’s resignation, that had reached the President’s office officially, the Chairman of the Presidency office said on Monday.   “President Jalal Talabani has received the official resignation of his First Vice-President, Adel Abdul-Mahdi, but the President has not decided whether to accept or refuse the resignation, and that won’t be decided unless the President knows the reasons that made Abdul-Mahdi present his resignation,” Naseer al-Ani told IraqiNews.com news agency.   Al-Ani said that a meeting, time of which was not decided yet, would be held between President Talabani and his 1 st Vice-President, Adel Abdul-Mahdi, to discuss the reasons that made the latter present his resignation, in the light of which the President would decide his position to refuse or accept Abdul-Mahdi’s resignation.   The Leader in the (Shiite) Supreme Islamic Council (SIC), Juma’a al-Atwany, told IraqiNews.com on Monday that Iraq’s 1 st Vice-President, Adel Abdul-Mahdi, had   officially presented his resignation to President Jalal Talabani, in response to the wish of the SIC’s leadership, “because the problem of the mechanism of the political process had been discovered by all,” pointing out that the SIC won’t present a substitute for Abdul-Mahdi for the said post.   Noteworthy is that SIC’s Leading member Adel Abdul-Mahdi had apologized, in a letter to President Talabani,   to accept the post of Vice-President, adding that he had informed the SIC Chairman, Ammar al-Hakim, to nominate another person for the post.   Iraqi Presidency sources had said that Talabani had refused Abdul-Mahdi’s demand and convinced him to accept the post of 1 st Vice-President, followed with the Parliament’s decision to accept the appointment of three Vice-Presidents – SIC Leader, Adel Abdul-Mahdi, the Leader in al-Iraqiya Coalition, Tareq al-Hashimy and the Shiite al-Daawa – Iraqi Organization’s Party Leader, Khudhier al-Khuza’e.   Adel Abdul-Mahdi, born in 1948, is one of the Shiite SIC leaders, chaired by Ammar al-Hakim. He was sentenced to death by Iraq ’s former Baath regime in the 1960s for his political acitivity. He then moved to live in Iran , then took the position of SIC’s Representative in north Iraq ’s Kurdistan Region from 1992 to 1996.   And after Iraq’s occupation by the U.S. forces in 2003, he become a member in Iraq’s ruling former Transitional Ruling Council, then held the position of Finance Minister in al-Iraqiya Leader Iyad Allawi’s cabinet, followed by his assignment as Vice-President, after current Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, formed his previous government.   SKH (FT)     537