KURD PARTIES HAVE CHOSEN INCLUSIVENESS
By Khaled Salih
Daily Star
Friday, August 14, 2009
Lebanon
On July 25, the people of the Kurdistan region in Iraq for the
first time elected a regional president and for the second time a
new Parliament. The elections took place in accordance with Iraq’s
new Constitution, which was approved by popular vote in October 2005
and recognizes the region and its institutions as a federal unit in
Iraq. The turnout of 79 percent of the region’s 2.5 million eligible
voters was seen by political leaders and outside observers as a very
positive sign of democratic engagement. Except for a couple of minor
security incidents, the elections were peaceful in an area seen by
many extremist Islamist groups throughout Iraq as a close ally of
the United States and as too secular to be imagined as part of their
Islamist state.
Many commentators and analysts were critical of political arrangements
for both Parliament and the government during the past three years,
charging that there was no provision for a proper opposition. Without
exception, they all missed the point that the political parties in
Kurdistan had settled for an all-inclusive power-sharing agreement
for two important reasons.
First, in order to ease the tension between political forces that
in the recent past (during the mid-1990s) fought each other, an
extensive and intensive process of reconciliation could work only if
all relevant players were part of the political process. Power-sharing
also allowed the divided administration of Kurdistan (between the
Kurdistan Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan)
to be reunited.
Second, at the federal level Kurdistan needed to put up a united
front representing the entire region and all its political views in
the Iraqi Parliament and government. Although not without difficulty,
both goals were achieved in the past three years. Kurdistan has become
more internally peaceful and secure and the Kurdistan Alliance List
has remained a united and active player in Baghdad.
However, this time things are different. In the July elections this
year, the voters re-elected Massoud Barzani, the current president of
the Kurdistan region, from among five candidates. Barzani represented
the Kurdistani List (composed of the KDP he leads and the PUK led by
Jalal Talabani, currently Iraq’s president). In 2006, the president
was elected by the Parliament and there were no other candidates. Now,
the re-election of Barzani by 70 percent of the popular votes will
strengthen his position and enable him to play a more active role in
the coming four years in the region as well as in relation to Baghdad.
For the parliamentary election, the voters this time could choose
among 25 parties, lists and individuals. In contrast to the last
parliamentary election, there were diverse political programs,
alternatives and messages to take into account. A major shift occurred
with the PUK. One of Talabani’s veteran aides, Newshirwan Mustafa,
formed his own Change List. Another change was a new alliance called
the Service and Reform List (between two Kurdish Islamist parties,
one socialist group and a communist politician who was expelled from
his party).
Out of 111 seats in Parliament, 11 are reserved for minorities living
in the Kurdistan region (five for the Assyrian community, five for
the Turkmen community, and one for the Armenians). The preliminary
results showed the Kurdistani List (KDP and PUK) gaining 59 seats,
the Change List 25 seats, Service and Reform 14 seats and the Islamic
Movement in Kurdistan-Iraq two seats. In sharp contrast to the past
three years, we will witness heated debate in Parliament on a wide
range of internal Kurdish issues as well as how to deal with the
federal government in Baghdad.
Although the Kurdistani List will have no difficulty in forming a
majority government (that most probably will also be supported by
nine out of 11 minority candidates), the major difficulty facing the
Kurdistan region is the next federal election in January 2010. If the
current provincial pattern of alliances is repeated at the federal
level, the risk of weakened Kurdish representation in Baghdad is
obvious.
In the coming four years, Kurdish leaders will face several major
political issues. Internally, these include security, reconstruction
and development, further democratization of the political system,
allegations of corruption, issues of internal displacement,
provincial elections and most probably political party reform. A
majority government with a vibrant opposition in the Parliament should
facilitate dealing with them.
In relation to Baghdad, several constitutional issues will dominate
the agenda: the boundaries of the Kurdistan region (the final status
of the disputed territories), the revenue-sharing law, the oil and
gas law, the status of the Kurdish paramilitary Peshmerga, and the
power-sharing mechanism at the federal level. A strongly supported
president might be able to push more adamantly for the implementation
of Iraq’s Constitution as it was agreed in August 2005 and voted for
by four out of five Iraqis throughout the country two months later.
Khaled Salih is a senior advisor to the prime minister of the Kurdistan
Regional Government. These are his personal views. This commentary
first appeared at bitterlemons-international.org, an online newsletter
that publishes views on Middle Eastern and Islamic issues.