There are elections and elections, there are many Arab presidents who are elected with 99.9, 94.7, 87.4 percent of the vote in elections but nobody believes these elections. They're not real elections and the election that's going to be held in Iraq in January, if it is held at all - and there is a big question mark over that - will not be a real election. How can you have a real election with hundreds of thousands of Crusader soldiers occupying the country, drawing up the electoral law, deciding who is allowed to take part in the elections, and utterly dominating the political life of the country?
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- Galloway argues elections under foreign occupation cannot be considered real.
- In plain terms
- Elections under occupation are not legitimate.
- What can you take from it?
- Occupation invalidates elections.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- What makes an election real?
- Can you vote under occupation?
Another view
It assumes local actors lack agency under occupation.
More from George Galloway
'I am on the anti-imperialist left.' The Stalinist left? 'I wouldn't define it that way because of the pejoratives loaded around it; that would be making a rod…
Permalink to quote #2 The people who invaded and destroyed Iraq and have murdered more than a million Iraqi people by sanctions and war will burn in Hell in the hell-fires, and thei…
Permalink to quote #4 Your Excellency, Mr President: I greet you, in the name of the many thousands of people in Britain who stood against the tide and opposed the war and aggressio…
Permalink to quote #1
Related quotes
A Government protected by foreigners will never be accepted by a free people.
Napoleon BonaparteNapoleon Bonaparte quote #33 I would be unelectable. I'm an atheist. As we all know, that is something people won't accept.
Ron ReaganRon Reagan quote #1 Those who try to give us advice on matters of human rights do nothing but provoke an ironic smile among us. We will not permit anyone to interfere in our affai…
Konstantin ChernenkoKonstantin Chernenko quote #1