Agence France Presse, 07 December 2005
Iraqi advertisers are savouring a rare economic boom in a country gripped by election fever as ballot box hopefuls fritter away small fortunes on plastering the capital in wall-to-wall campaign literature.
In a war-torn country ravaged by cripping unemployment and a daily diet of bloodshed, economic miracles -- however transitory -- are a welcome break.
"Everyone is participating in these elections, even the Sunnis who boycotted the last vote," said an optimistic Khalil Ibrahim al-Badri, director of the Al-Nile advertising company in Baghdad.
"Twenty specialised Iraqi printers are working day and night to meet demand from the different coalition lists," Badri explained, lauding a boom that he says has employed many previously jobless Iraqis.
A recent government and UN report put unemployment at 27 percent, but many experts believe the actual number is closer to 50 percent, in a country that was once one of the most prosperous and progressive in the Middle East.
More than 220 separate entities -- be they coalitions, individuals or parties -- are competing in the crunch December 15 election when 15 million voters are eligible to elect a four-year, 275-member national assembly.
Available walls, concrete blast slabs, shopfronts and apartment buildings have been wallpapered with posters and billboards as candidates compete to capture the electorate's imagination.
Qusay Rashid Saheb, owner of Al-Assala printers, says that candidates have lavished huge amounts of money on their election hopes.
Sunni candidate Saleh al-Motlaq apparently ordered 1,000 billboards, each two by three metres (six by nine feet), coughing up an estimated 300,000 dollars to have his beaming photograph decorating the streets of the capital.
But Motlaq -- standing for the Sunnis' Iraqi Concord Front list -- is small fry compared to political heavyweights such as former prime minister Iyad Allawi, campaigning on a secular Shiite ticket.
Allawi, who has also bankrolled a lavish television campaign, and ex-defence minister Hazem al-Shaalan had their print advertising work done in Jordan, because Iraqi companies could not cope with the orders, Saheb said.
Walls aside, the front and back pages of newspapers are also covered with gaudy colour pictures and advertisements.
In the Sunni newspaper Mashriq, the Iraqi Concord Front features the mug shots of three candidates superimposed over a picture of the rising sun breaking through clouds, with the slogan: "Clean Hands".
Despite the big bucks, candidates are sticking to a surprisingly uniform format tacitly agreed between the different movements participating in the vote: religious, Sunni, Shiite, Kurd, communist and secular.
Most have the Iraqi flag in the background, foreground or margin. Equally prominent is the photograph of the candidate in question and the three-digit number of their list.
The different colours are the prerogative of the rival clans, says Maytham al-Shummari, an advertising graphic designer.
"Blue is the colour of Sunni parties, because it is neutral while the Shiite lists choose green, the symbol of Islam. The Kurds have adopted the colours of their flag, red, green and yellow, and the Christians violet," he said.
Slogans also vary and reflect the traditional policies of the various sectarian groups.
The Shiite camps typically promise to fight against terrorism and promote stability. Sunnis prefer a simple "Yes to the occupiers' leaving" and "with your vote we'll change the constitution".
The Sunnis criticised various points of Iraq's first post-Saddam Hussein charter -- adopted at a referendum on October 15 -- as tantamount to paving the way to a break-up of Iraq, which can only be amended by the new parliament.
-----------------------------------------------
Citation: "Iraq gripped by advertising boom in election run-up," Agence France Presse, 07 December 2005.
Original URL: http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20051207/wl_mideast_afp/iraqvoteadvertising
-----------------------------------------------