Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani has not been seen in public for a decade, refuses to meet his country’s US overlords and figures on no party’s list of candidates. Nevertheless, the grey-bearded recluse stands on the threshold of elections that are likely to allow his people to assume power in Iraq after decades of oppression.

Eighty miles north, an equally dignified figure stands worried at a podium beneath the seal of the presidential office he will hold for just six more weeks.

Sheikh Ghazi al-Yawer, resplendent in a black and golden robe, is surrounded by the accoutrements of power to which his fellow Sunnis have become accustomed. He can already see power slipping away to Iraq’s 65 per cent Shia majority after the multiparty elections on January 30.

But worse, he fears that his 20 per cent Sunni Arab minority, fired up by anti-American preachers blaring hatred and jihad from minarets, are about to marginalise themselves even further by boycotting or disrupting the poll.

They could repeat the Shias’ historic mistake of January 1924, when religious figures issued fatwas to shun British colonial-era elections.

“In the 1920s the Shia clerics did not push the Shias to participate in the political life in Iraq and this led to great suffering by their people,” Sheikh Yawer said recently. “We must learn the lesson. Elections, regardless of timing, are our salvation in Iraq.”

This week he went further, warning US commanders that a new dictator could arise if Iraqis continue to feel powerless in their own country.

“This could, in the long term, create an environment in which an Iraqi Hitler could emerge like the one created by the defeat of Germany and the humiliation of Germans in the First World War,” he told Asharq al-Awsat newspaper.

But while some Sunnis believe that they must maximise their seats in the 275-seat National Assembly, observers believe that many have not adjusted to new political realities.

“I’m not sure whether they get it, that they can’t run this country like they ran it in the past,” a Western diplomat told The Times. “The problem is reaching out to the organised Sunni community, which identifies with various elements of the insurgency.”

While Sunnis debate participation, delay or boycott, Shias and Kurds are racing ahead with their own preparations for the vote, aware that the post-election government will write Iraq’s new constitution.

In the Shia south, Ayatollah al-Sistani’s edict urging all his followers to vote is plastered on walls, alongside slogans declaring: “A vote is worth more than gold.” In Najaf Sheikh Sadreddin al-Kubanji recently told worshippers: “This time we must take the place we deserve in the institutions of Iraq.”

Times Recommends

• Gloves off as McCain lands Obama 'lie' jibe
• Anger as terrorist gets bail for IVF
• US hands palace of Saddam back to Iraqis