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Four questions on Basra and Iraq’s political stakes
BAGHDAD, Sept 12, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi
faces calls to quit after deadly protests in southern Basra crushed his
fledgling, and vital, alliance with a popular Shiite cleric.
With the new parliament set to meet Saturday to swear in its speaker the
political stakes are high, and experts say Abadi’s position highlights Iraq’s
dilemma, caught between its two allies, bitter foes Iran and the United
States.
Here are four questions and answers to help unravel the intricacies of
Iraqi politics.
– Why did Basra spark a political crisis? –
After years of devastating war against jihadists, anger over rampant
corruption, unemployment and decrepit public services boiled over last week
into protests in oil-rich Basra, which left 12 dead.
Late Friday demonstrators also set the Iranian consulate in Basra on fire,
shouting “Iran out”, referring to the city’s influential neighbour.
Amid the violence, Iraqi Shiite firebrand cleric, Moqtada Sadr, whose bloc
won the May elections, distanced himself from his one-time ally Abadi,
withdrawing from an alliance reached less then two weeks ago.
On Saturday, a rival alliance of pro-Iranian former paramilitary fighters
did a swift U-turn, vowing to now work with Sadr to form a new government to
exclude Abadi.
It accused the beleaguered prime minister of having “failed” to meet the
demands of the protesters, who say the government has unfairly distributed
the country’s oil wealth.
– Is Abadi out? –
Abadi’s political group came third in the May 12 elections, and he had
depended on the September 2 accord with Sadr’s alliance and 14 other groups
to create the largest force in the 329-seat legislature.
The loss of Sadr’s support could now cost Abadi his parliamentary
majority, yet again delaying the formation of a new government.
In another blow, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, the spiritual leader of
Iraq’s Shiite majority, hinted in a statement on Monday that he was opposed
to Abadi staying in the post, saying he didn’t want a new prime minister “who
had already been in power”.
MORE/SSS/1738 hrs
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“It’s the final blow to the American plan,” said Qais al-Khazali, a
leading member of the pro-Iran bloc, Asaib Ahl al-Haq.
In the post since 2014, Abadi has been perceived as the preferred
“candidate of the West” with the nomination of a prime minister long a tacit
agreement between Iran and the United States.
– What happens next? –
All eyes will be on Saturday’s parliamentary session when it is set to
elect its new speaker. The results of the vote will give a concrete
indication of how the behind-the-scenes haggling is playing out.
If the pro-Iran bloc appears to have gained the upper hand with the
numbers to form a government, it will still have to find a candidate
acceptable to all sides.
Some experts say it may well look to a technocrat candidate so far not
well-known publicly, as was the case for Abadi in 2014.
– Move towards Iran? –
If the pro-Iran bloc does appear to be taking power, the unrest which
swept Basra may well limit its margin of manouevre, experts said.
Even though the two neighbours fought a bitter war in the 1980s, Iran is a
key power broker in Iraq and many of the armed groups and political parties
whose offices were torched in the unrest are known to be close to the Islamic
republic.
“This crisis has shown that in the Iraqi national consciousness, the
country is far from having turned the page on the rivalry with Iran, and that
the wounds which had only been patched up are quickly re-opened,” said Karim
Bitar, head of research at the Paris-based Institute for International and
Strategic Affairs.
Since the defeat of Islamic State group jihadists who once captured a
swathe of the country “there is a return of Iraqi national feeling and
demands focused on living standards, the fight against corruption and bad
governance,” he said.
During the 1980-1988 war “Basra was on the frontlines” and came under “a
hail of Iranian shelling,” recalled political analyst Essam al-Fili, a
university professor in Baghdad.
Since the 2003 fall of dictator Saddam Hussein it has lived “under the
tight control of Islamic parties heavily tied” to Iran.
“A future government which served the interests of Iran first and foremost
will be quickly toppled by public opinion,” he insisted.
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