On
October 15, millions of Iraqis are expected to head to the
ballot box to vote on the referendum for the adoption of a new
national constitution.
However,
if the past few weeks of constant wrangling and bickering
between the Shiite, Sunni, and Kurdish factions on the wording
of the document are any indication, further difficulties may lie
in store for Iraq’s arduous road to democracy.
First
off, rules put in place by an elected assembly of
legislators—under the tutelage of the United Nations—have
already been broken.
The
drafting of the constitution was scheduled to be completed by
August 15. When that deadline is breached, the national assembly
is by law meant to dissolve itself. This would be followed by
another round of elections.
This
part of the law was not implemented and for good reason. The
current national assembly is comprised mainly of Shiite and
Kurdish legislators. The Sunnis have token representation
because of a nation-wide boycott of the elections last January.
Since then, prominent Sunnis, including the influential
Association of Muslim Scholars, have reversed course and called
on all Sunnis to partake in the next round of elections.
This
is evident in the formidable showing of Sunnis at voter
registration offices throughout Iraq in the last few weeks,
particularly in battle-ravaged Anbar
province.
Therefore, any elections that were meant to be held after the
assembly’s dissolution would have likely ushered a stronger,
more vocal Sunni bloc.
For
the current Shiite and Kurdish legislators, this was
unacceptable.
So,
the debate over how to word the constitution continued and now
seems to be lost in the great ether of confusion.
The
Sunnis complained that the current wording emphasized
federalism, a notion they fear will give a carte blanche for the
Shiite majority in southern Iraq
to
secede, or at the very least, adopt an autonomous form of
governance much akin to what has existed in Iraqi Kurdistan for
the past 15 years. However, the
Sunnis
seem to have reluctantly accepted the status quo of Kurdish
autonomy.
The
trepidation over the potential for secession goes beyond mere
national aspirations to keep the country from fragmenting. At
the very heart of this dilemma is the location of Iraq’s most
durable national asset—oil. Iraq’s south, stretching from Al
Nasiriyah to the port of Oum Qasr, lies atop billions of barrels
of oil, most yet to be discovered and mined. Iraq’s north,
particularly the area surrounding Kirkuk and stretching north
east to the Zagros mountains, is also oil rich. The center,
which could possibly be what the Sunnis are left with, is mostly
arid with a few agricultural cantons.
Not
surprisingly, the Association of Muslim Scholars announced in
early September that it remained steadfast to a unified Iraq and
would ensure the country not be divided. Perhaps, a veiled
threat can be read into such a statement; the US military fears
that if the Sunnis become disenfranchised with the political
process, they will resort to armed conflict, plunging the
country perilously close to all-out civil war.
Enter
then US ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, a veteran mediator of
Afghan real-politik and in-fighting. The day after Iraqi
president Jalal Talabani announced the constitution
had been drafted and was ready to be put to a national
referendum, Khalilzad met with several senior Sunni politicians
and announced that the “final,
final draft” had not yet been secured. This was followed by a
sharp rebuke from the Arab League, which criticized the draft
for not including Iraq’s Arab heritage and role in the
wording.
On
September 6, the United Nations, charged with printing and
distributing five million copies of the constitution, announced
that they could not successfully meet the task prior to October
15. According to UN sources, it takes two weeks to print five
million copies and up to another month to distribute them
throughout the country.
Iraqis
will head to polls without a proper understanding of what
the constitution prescribes for their country’s future. |
|
Printing
was due to begin on Thursday, September 8, but this was again
postponed after yet another amendment was introduced late on
Wednesday. The amendment,
promises,
electoral profiles, and so on—is central for the electorate to
make informed decisions for a nation’s future.
In
1997, the government of the world’s largest democracy, India,
issued a report (Working Group on Right to Information and
Promotion of Open and Transparent Government, Report, Ministry
of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, New Delhi, 1997
paragraph 2.1. Cited as India Report) stating that “it is now
widely recognised that openness and accessibility of people to
information about the government’s functioning is a vital
component of democracy.”
The
current Iraqi parliament has already failed in recognizing the
importance of ensuring that Iraqis heading to the polls have
access to the document that is the focus of the referendum.
Furthermore,
confusion has been added by the existence of two versions of the
same draft, each with a different introduction in Arabic. The
first begins, “We the peoples of Iraq...” while the second
version starts off with “We the peoples of the valley of two
rivers...” It is unclear which version will be submitted to
the United Nations but their is stark distinction between the
two versions. The latter would seem to indicate that people
living in Iraq are not constitutionally obliged to call
themselves Iraqi and this
could potentially open the door for changing the name of the
country at some point.
There
are also concerns that the current wording of the constitution
will not only reverse gains for the emancipation of women in
Iraqi society but entrench further restrictions. Reference to
Islamic Shari`ah in the constitution has heightened fears that
an Iranian-style theocracy lies ahead.
According
to Nimat Hafez Barazangi, a Cornell University research fellow
in Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, who provided advice
on the constitution, several issues on the role of women
remained outstanding. Violence against women is not
ruled
out in the draft; the role of women is attributed to a family
and home setting; provisions outlining the role of women in
parliament expire within two years.
But
the issue of the emancipation of Iraqi women and affording them
their due rights may be shelved come October 15 when Iraqis are
faced with a decisive moment in their history, and
political—if not geopolitical—concerns take precedence. For
the referendum to be struck down, a majority in three provinces
must say no. According to UN estimates, Sunnis are a majority in
four Iraqi provinces. They have also been reaching out to Shiite
factions, notably the ones led by Muqtada Al Sadr, to form a
strong block against the referendum.
There
is also the wild card to be played by secular and nationalistic
Shiites, who see Iraq as distinctly an Arab nation and fear
disintegration.
It
is a precarious juncture, for sure. On the one hand, if the
referendum passes, it will firstly raise cries of foul play by
the Sunnis, who now believe they have the upper hand in the
vote. This could lead to an increase in the level of violence or
fuel a civil war.
If
the referendum does not pass, it will take Iraqis back to the
drawing table, an option that may disenchant several sectors of
Iraqi society who say they have not yet witnessed any
socio-political progress since Saddam Hussein was toppled.
