Iraqi exiles praise vice president’s election law veto

Phil Sands and Nizar Latif, Foreign Correspondents

• Last Updated: November 19. 2009 11:04PM UAE / November 19. 2009 7:04PM GMT

Damascus and Baghdad // Tareq al Hashemi’s decision to veto Iraq’s election laws may have thrown January’s ballot into chaos and received condemnation at home and in the US, but it was welcomed yesterday by many of the Iraqi exiles who feared their voices would be lost in the vote.

Mr al Hashemi, one of Iraq’s two vice presidents, blocked election legislation on Wednesday, saying it under-represented hundreds of thousands of Iraqi refugees living outside of the country.

In combination with Iraq’s Christian and other minority groups, they were to receive five per cent of 323 parliamentary seats, a figure the Iraqi vice president said should be increased to 15 per cent.

“I fully support the need to give more seats to the exiles,” said Jalil Abu Arshad, a well-respected Iraqi community figure living in the Damascus suburb of Sahnaiya. “The parliament agreed to have one MP representing each 100,000 Iraqis and nobody can believe that the seven or so seats that would be chosen by refugees is enough.

“There are millions of Iraqis with no choice but to live outside the country and they have the right to a say in choosing the next government. This is a matter of democratic principles, it has nothing to do with Sunni, Shia or Kurd.”

Critics of Mr al Hashemi, a Sunni, have accused him of issuing the veto as a political ploy to boost support for Sunni Arab politicians. Although there are no official numbers, it is widely believed that Sunnis make up the majority of Iraqis who fled the country after the 2003 US-led invasion and subsequent take over of the government by Shiite political groups.

“There are many Shiites, Christians and Sunnis living outside of Iraq,” said Mr Abu Arshad. “The law should be changed to give all of them a voice.”

The United Nations estimated there to be some two million Iraqis living in Syria and Jordan at the beginning of the year. A large proportion of those who fled are the educated middle classes, many of whom deplore what they view as divisive, sectarian politics of the current parties. Anecdotally, few consider themselves to be supporters of the prime minister, Nouri al Maliki.

Abu Khlalid, another Iraqi refugee living in Sahnaiya, said the original effort to limit exiles to five per cent of the vote was an effort to silence critics of the government.

“None of the refugees support al Maliki,” he said, referring to the Iraqi prime minister, Nouri al Maliki. “How could we support a man who has failed to make the country safe enough for us to return to?”

There are widespread concerns that the January election date, called for under Iraq’s constitution, will be missed now that parliament has to reconsider the long-delayed election rules. Mr al Hashemi insisted there was no cause for extended debate because he disputed only one clause. But achieving an agreement among Iraq’s fractured legislators is a notoriously lengthy process and there is every possibility that other contentious issues, only narrowly agreed under duress at the start of the month, will now be reopened.

The Kurdish regional president, Massoud Barzani, has already made it clear he feels his people were under-represented by the original law and had been expecting to have 17 more parliamentary seats than were allocated.

Adel Berwari, an MP from the Kurdistan Alliance, said there were severe doubts about the “credibility and integrity” of the allocation of parliamentary seats, and indicated there would have to be an entire review of the matter.

“We will demand the equitable division of seats between all provinces,” he said. “And we will not accept that the Kurdish provinces are given less than their fair share.”

Iraq’s president, Jalal Talabani, who formally approved the laws, also revealed he had done so with severe reservations, saying the number of seats set aside for minorities and expatriates should be tripled – the same criticism made by Mr al Hashemi.

Iraq’s election commission has said that some preparations have now been put on hold, which means further delays appear to be unavoidable.

Speaking earlier this week, the United Nations envoy to Iraq, Ad Melkert, said organising the election would be a “Herculean task”, saying that time is “really very, very short”. That was before the veto was issued.

If too many days are taken up by parliamentary debate, the election could be forced back to March or even later. The original timeline of January was chosen, in large part, to avoid a Shiite religious festival due to take place at the start of February, in which hundreds of thousands of people walk across the country to Kerbala. It would be impossible to hold a vote at the same time.

Ahmed Yassin Qaisi, a professor of political science at Baghdad’s Mustansariya University, said the election rules as originally drafted were flawed but that further postponements of the ballot were dangerous.

“The proposals made by Hashemi should be implemented but we have to hope Iraq’s politicians do so quickly,” he said. “Any delays could lead to greater problems and will give al Qa’eda room to exploit the fragile situation and differences that exist.

“Elections are also a key step in the planned withdrawal of US forces, so there is much at stake.”

It remains unclear precisely what procedural manoeuvres will take place over the law but among the possibilities are that the Mr al Hashemi’s veto will be challenged in Iraqi courts as unconstitutional.

Mr al Maliki urged the election commission to continue its preparations for the ballot “without any delay”.

Insisting the veto had no constitutional basis he said it represented “a dangerous threat to the political process and democracy”.

psands@thenational.ae

nlatif@thenational.ae

Phil Sands reported from Damascus, Nizar Latif was in Baghdad