Yesterday, Iraq beat Syria in a football match. (Click here for Prashant Rao's AFP report.) Alsumaria reports Nouri has declared today he is serious about building up Iraqi sports. In other words, some athletes played an outstanding game and now its time for politicians to leech on in an attempt to steal some glory for themselves. (The leeching is not confined to Iraq, you see it in every country of the world.) Will it distract from Nouri's many failures? Probably not.
Nor will it erase the fact that Anbar and Nineveh are not being allowed to vote. A variety of excuses have been offered for Nouri's decision. It is not popular. The United Nations and the United States have called it out. NINA notes today that Sahwa leader Sheikh Ahmed Abu Risha is calling for the decision to be rescinded.
These are provincial elections and they're supposed to take place April 20th. Mustafa Habib (Niqash) reported earlier this month on the basics this campaign go around:
Geographically Iraq is now divided into its different
majority sects, with Shiite Muslim majorities dominating in some areas
and Sunni Muslims dominating in others. In the areas where there is a
Shiite Muslim majority, the Shiite Muslim political parties will be
competing against one another. In areas where there is not, they have
formed alliances so that they can stand together to compete against
Sunni Muslim parties. And the Sunni Muslim dominated political parties
are doing the same, in reverse.
The official map of political alliances shows that Shiite
Muslim parties will compete against one another in the nine Shiite
Muslim-majority provinces of Wasit, Karbala, Babel, Missan, Qadisiya,
Najaf, Dhi Qar, Muthana and Basra.
Meanwhile Sunni Muslim parties will compete against one
another in the Sunni Muslim-majority provinces of Anbar, Mosul, Diyala
and Salahaddin. The capital city, Baghdad, which is home to a wider
mixture of sects, religions and even ethnicities, remains a more
difficult prospect for both sides.
In the Shiite Muslim-dominated provinces there is fierce
competition between three Shiite Muslim political groups: the State of
Law coalition led by the current Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, the
Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq and the Sadrist bloc, which is led by
cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Each of these three large groups has chosen to
compete against the others in Shiite Muslim-dominated areas. They have
also formed alliances with smaller Shiite Muslim groups inside those
areas. And usually these alliances have been formed in terms that favour
the larger blocs.
The State of Law bloc – whose mainstay is the Dawa party
led by Iraq’s current Prime Minister al-Maliki – claims that it is
popular enough to win on its own in Shiite Muslim dominated areas. It
doesn’t need to form any kind of alliance and the party faithful tout
the results of the 2009 provincial elections as proof. In 2009, the
State of Law was able to send governors to five capital cities: Baghdad,
Wasit, Diwaniya (the capital of Qadisiya), Karbala and Basra.
Nouri doesn't need anyone else? He thought that when he started State of Law as well. And then came the March 2010 parliamentary elections when he and State of Law came in second to Ayad Allawi's Iraqiya.
Yesterday, we noted this from Henri J. Barkey's Los Angeles Times column:
With very few exceptions, an important event in Iraq went unnoticed in the U.S. media this month. Prime Minister Nouri Maliki sent a force that included helicopters to western Iraq to arrest Rafi Issawi, the former finance minister and a leading Sunni Arab opposition member. Issawi, who was protected by armed members of the Abu Risha clan, one of post-2003 Iraq's most powerful Sunni tribes, escaped capture.
The column is huge today in Arabic social media -- that paragraph from it -- and even Iraq Times is reporting on it. It did not garner a great deal of attention in real time -- and no attention from the US media. From the March 12th snapshot:
In possibly related news, the Minister of Finance was targeted today. Alsumaria reports that Iraqiya is calling for Nouri's government to explain exactly what happened today in Anbar Province when Nouri's forces went for Rafie al-Issawi. Were they attempting to kill him or were they hoping to kidnap him? Some may say al-Issawi resigned; however, Nouri refused to accept that resignation and stated al-Issawi could not resign until Nouri's investigation into him was complete. al-Issawi is a Sunni and a member of Iraqiya. It appears that this identity is why he was targeted today.
The Iraqi football players' win isn't likely to erase that memory either.
And in more bad news for Nouri, Alsumaria reports that MP Sabah al-Saadi declared today that he is calling for lead justice on the Federal Court, Nouri's crony Judge Medhat al-Mahmoud, to be charged with crimes against humanity. al-Mahmoud was pulled from the bench then put back on by Nouri. Critics argues that as long as al-Mahmoud sits on the bench, the judiciary will bend to Nouri.
For decades Turkish forces and the PKK have been inc onflict. Currently, the two sides are embracing a ceasefire. Hopefully, it will hold. Sunday, Kurdistan Regional Government President Massoud Barzani issued the following statement:
Salahaddin, Kurdistan Region, Iraq (KRP.org) - In a statement released today, Kurdistan Region President Masoud Barzani welcomed a message by the imprisoned PKK leader Abdulah Ocalan in which he calls for a ceasefire and the pursuit of democratic and political means to address the Kurdish question in Turkey.
“We not only support and welcome this call by Mr Ocalan, we believe that this is the right course of action and a vindication of our long-standing policy that the Kurdish question is a political issue and that this question cannot be resolved through armed or military means,” said the statement by President Barzani.
“The success of the peace process requires the commitment of all sides to perseverance and patience. The peace process must be viewed by all sides with strategic importance and not merely as a political tactic. We call on all sides to take practical steps towards the peaceful and political resolution of the Kurdish question.”
The statement by the President concluded by saying that as in the past, the Kurdistan Region of Iraq is ready to play any role to ensure this peace process succeeds and a political resolution of the Kurdish question in Turkey is found.
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