By Reidar Visser (www.historiae.org)
After today’s official release by the Iraqi elections commission of the seat allocation in the new Iraqi provincial councils elected on 31 January, the process of forming new coalitions can begin in earnest. Since the provisional result was released two weeks ago, the various parties have had some time to calculate their likely share of the seats and initiate a process of negotiation with prospective partners, but small percentage differences can have dramatic implications for the mathematics of coalitions and hence the exact political landscape only became apparent today.