The Basra Test.(Brief article)

With the KRG area and the Kirkuk region exempt from the Jan. 31 elections, geography dictates that the crucial test of the electoral outcome will be events in the oil-rich Basra region in the south. With the overwhelming share of Iraq proven oil reserves, Basra is key to export revenue to the development of oil export capacity and the rebuilding of Iraq's national wealth.

Basra elites have gained from a tightened grip over the region since the 2003 invasion, with its main political factions able to finance large organisations by controlling shares of the oil flows and organising gigantic crude oil and fuel-smuggling schemes. Maleki was quick to use security gains in the second half of 2007 as an opportunity to turn on the southern factions in March 2008, but it still remains to be seen if there has been a genuine change of political allegiance in that southern region, or if the militias have just gone underground to take a different, less overtly separatist, guise. Secessionist Basra politicians had failed to organize an autonomy referendum in January, as it seemed that too few people were willing to sign the petitions required to force a vote amid some - probably government sanctioned - intimidation.

Yet a newly emboldened regional governing body could revisit the issue, which is thought to have the support of a substantial proportion of the Basra population - though not necessarily a majority. An attempt by Basra to gain similar autonomy as the KRG would be far too big a threat to the central government's control of the country and revenues and is likely to spark resistance. This would lead to a similar deadlock developing in the south as in the north, with devastating consequences for Baghdad efforts to award oil and gas fields to IOCs under TSAs.

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