Shia politician and former exile Mr Ibrahim al-Jaafari emerged as the front-runner today to become Iraq's new prime minister as horse-trading to decide the line-up of the next government entered the final stages.
Mr Jaafari, a physician and father of five, is head of the Dawa Party, one of two leading religious parties in the United Iraqi Alliance, an Islamist Shia-led group that won 48 per cent of the vote in elections on January 30th.
"The competition is still fierce but it appears so far that Jaafari will be the United Iraqi Alliance candidate because is insisting on him," a senior Shia source said.
Mr Jaafari (58), who holds the largely ceremonial role of vice president in the current interim government, fled Iraq in 1980 after thousands of Dawa members were murdered by Saddam Hussein's regime.
His family remains in London. Although the alliance did not win the 60 per cent it hoped for, the vote puts the coalition in a commanding position to take the top job in the next government.
A two-thirds majority is needed in the newly elected National Assembly to form a government. The alliance, formed with the backing of top Shia cleric Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, is headed by Dawa and the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), both of which opposed Saddam Hussein from exile in Iran.
The source said SCIRI, led by Abdel-Aziz al-Hakim, had agreed to support Mr Jaafari and withdraw its candidate, Finance Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi, "to preserve the unity of the alliance", which some had feared could collapse after the vote.
He said a final deal was unlikely today.