Kurdish leaders are drunk with power
by Michael Rubin
Daily
Star (Beirut)
July 1, 2009
http://www.meforum.org/2172/kurdish-leaders-drunk-with-power
On June 12, Iranians voted for a
president. While the Islamic Republic may not be a democracy, its
leadership has always looked to the polls to bestow popular legitimacy.
Ayatollah Ahmad Janati, chairman of the Guardian Council, for example,
said just two days before the election: "The enemies have always tried to
question the legitimacy of the regime by trying to reduce public
participation in elections ... The people must blind the eyes of the
enemies by vast participation in elections." Iran's desire for elections,
however, does not extend to accepting their results. Outraged, millions
took to the streets across the country, some chanting "Death to the
Dictator."
Iranians, however, may not be the
only ones to take to the streets to protest election fraud this summer. On
July 25, Iraqi Kurds will vote in long-delayed regional elections. For the
first time, the major political figures - Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP)
leader Massoud Barzani and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) leader, and
Iraqi president, Jalal Talabani - face serious local opposition.
In the wake of Kuwait's liberation
in 1991, Iraqi Kurds rose up against Saddam Hussein's tyrannical rule.
Rather than allow Saddam's helicopter gunships to massacre the civilian
population, the United States, France, Turkey and Great Britain created a
safe-haven in northern Iraq. The following winter, Saddam withdrew Iraqi
officials from what would become Iraqi Kurdistan, believing he could
starve the Kurds into submission. It did not work. The Kurds organized
elections. Almost a million people voted. Barzani edged out Talabani, 45
to 44 percent, with smaller parties splitting the remainder. Power sharing
was not always smooth: Both leaders like to command; both became addicted
to power. So long as Saddam remained a threat, Kurds tolerated abuses.
Since Saddam's fall, however, impatience at the failure to reform has
grown.
While the Kurdistan Regional
Government could once describe itself as a democratic beacon in the
region, today such depictions lack credibility. Seventeen years after its
first election, Iraqi Kurdistan is at best as democratic as Egypt or Iran,
and worst akin to Syria or Tunisia. Corruption is rife. Barzani uses the
government budget as a family slush fund, for example donating hundreds of
millions of dollars from public coffers to allow a relative to win a 2007
bid to operate an Iraq-wide cell phone company. Few profitable businesses
- oil, finance, industry or trade - can operate without either silent
partnership with or outright payment to the Barzani or Talabani
families.
Nepotism is also rife. Barzani, for
example, appointed his son to head the region's intelligence service, the
dreaded Parastin, which Amnesty International has accused of torture.
While free media have become an engine for democracy in the rest of Iraq,
the Kurdish security services threaten, harass, and in some cases even
kill independent journalists.
The people of Iraqi Kurdistan say
they have had enough. Noshirwan Mustafa, Talabani's one-time deputy, has
joined the former KDP secretary general to form a rival election list. Two
prominent Islamic parties have joined with secular counterparts to create
an additional reform list. Both challenging lists are polling well.
Barzani and Talabani are worried.
Rather than allow open election lists as in the rest of Iraq, the Kurdish
leaders insist that party lists be closed, a way of preventing voter
repulsion at examples of nepotism or those known to be abusive of power.
As the rival lists, the Change List and the Service and Reform List, have
gained traction, the Kurdish security forces have threatened and roughed
up opposition candidates. Party officials have told apolitical bureaucrats
that they will lose their jobs if they do not support Barzani and
Talabani. There is widespread belief that KDP and PUK officials have
compromised the Independent Higher Election Commission's regional offices
after KDP security forces visited and, in some cases, arrested opposition
candidates within hours of their filing theoretically confidential
candidacy papers.
As has the Islamic Republic's
leaders, Iraqi Kurdistan's leaders speak of democracy, but have become
drunk with power, and disdainful of public accountability. As in Iran,
Kurdistan Regional Government officials have amassed vast fortunes
inconsistent with salaries. Today, ordinary Kurds refer to Barzani, his
nephew, and his sons, as "little Saddams." Actually, "little Rafsanjanis"
might be as accurate. As in Iran, Iraqi Kurdish officials have also worked
to constrain independent monitoring which might report on intimidation and
interference before election day.
As a consequence of all this, it
appears that the Iraqi Kurdish people seek change. What remains to be
seen, however, is if Iraqi Kurds will stand up for freedom and liberty as
have the Iranian protestors, and if the Iraqi Kurdish security forces
will, like their Iranian counterparts, use the point of a gun and midnight
roundups to disenfranchise a deserving people.
Michael Rubin, a senior editor
of the Middle East
Quarterly, is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and a
senior lecturer at the Naval Postgraduate
School.
Related Topics: Iraq, Kurds Michael
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