Manama: The Islamic Menbar, the political party which got the least number of votes in the 2010 elections, has blamed a political society for some of the losses it sustained.

"We will engage in a thorough study to assess what has happened," Dr Ali Ahmad, one of the two Islamic Menbar MPs who were elected, said.

"We were expecting some of the developments that unfolded before and during the polls, but we were also shocked by the behaviour and attitudes of the people in the political society who took advantage of the lack of coordination with Al Asala, the Salafi group, to strike at us heavily," he said in a statement. However he did not name the society.

Observers believe that he was referring to Al Wefaq, Bahrain's largest political society, which won in the 18 constituencies in which it fielded candidates, all of them men.

However, Khalil Marzooq, one of Al Wefaq leaders denied any wrongdoing.

"We never directed people to act against the Islamic Menbar," Khalil said. "The society lost because of a lack of coordination with Al Asala. The independent candidates greatly benefited from the strong competition and the absence of any form of alliance between the two societies, unlike what happened in 2006," he said.

According to Khalil, the Islamic Menbar also lost because its constituents were not satisfied with their performance level in the 2006 – 2010 parliament.

Al Menbar put forward eight candidates for the lower chamber where it had six in 2002 - 2006 and seven in 2006 – 2010.

However, only two were elected during the two rounds of elections on October 23 ad 30, and the other six, including the society leader Abdul Latif Al Shaikh, lost mainly to independent candidates.

The crushing defeat was attributed largely to a lack of coordination with Al Asala, the Salafi society, ahead of the elections. Both societies struck up an alliance in 2006 that allowed them to have 15 politicians in the 40-seat lower chamber.

However, Al Menbar, four days after the elections, said that other critical factors had contributed to their dismal results.