Al-Wefaq's Stand

Al-Wefaq boycotted today's second session of the Bahraini Parliament, at which royalist Khalifa adh-Dharani was chosen as speaker. Then they ended their boycott, claiming they had made their point. My guess is that they didn't think they had anything to lose if they couldn't muster the votes to elect one of their own as speaker. By staging the boycott, if nothing else they called attention to the inequalities in the electoral system where largely pro-regime districts have far fewer voters.

That said, Mahmood al-Yousif has wind of an investigation in Bandergate which could be the result of a deal between al-Wefaq and the regime. In any case, the two questions on the table now are what sort of investigation this turns out to be and what goals al-Wefaq pursues during the coming Parliamentary term.