BAGHDAD - Outgoing Iraqi prime minister Iyad Allawi's political bloc, the Iraqi list, will join a national unity government, but Allawi himself will not take up any post, a top advisor said Sunday.
"Yes this is our final decision. The Iraqi list will participate seriously and actively in the next government," Hani Idriss, a confidante of Allawi and senior member of his Iraqi National Accord party, told AFP.
"Allawi will just be a member of the parliament, but he will not preside over a ministry because he was nominated to be prime minister."
He emphasised Allawi's secular bloc wanted to play a major role in drafting the country's permanent constitution, which is scheduled for completion by mid-August.
"The most important thing is to participate in drafting the constitution and preparing for the end of 2005 elections."
Allawi's Iraqi list, with 40 seats in the 275-member parliament, has negotiated for weeks with the winning Shiite and Kurdish lists, but it was not clear if they would join the cabinet or decide to play the role of opposition in the new assembly.
Idriss said their bloc was still bargaining over posts.
"We asked for the interior ministry, but probably we'll get the interior or the defense ministry and one economy-related and two services related ministries."
The ex-Baathist Allawi, who was picked by the Americans, headed the interim government that guided Iraq from last July through the January 30 polls that gave the country its first freely- elected parliament in half- a- century.
He tendered his resignation by phone Thursday when the new parliament designated the religious Shiite Ibrahim Jaafari premier.
Allawi has staked his platform on secularism, in sharp contract to the top vote-getting Iraqi Shiite list, which is packed with Islamists.
The Kurdish coalition, the second largest faction in parliament, had hoped to lure Allawi into the government to help dilute the Shiite alliance's power.
04/10/2005 16:48 GMT