Is Iraq Falling Back Into Authoritarianism?

By: Ali Rawaf
  
     One sad fact about new democracies is that they might turn back into authoritarian regimes that ruled the country before those democracies emerged. Iraq's democracy might be one of those. Iraq is on the brink of falling back into an authoritarian regime, under Maliki's Dawa party.

We have witnessed Maliki's strong grip on his seat as Prime Minister. Though his term has constitutionally expired, Maliki and his cabinet still have full control of all three powers; executive, legislative, and judicial. The cabinet has signed contracts, appointed ambassadors, passed laws, all while the Parliament is not really in session. Maliki's powers are all unchecked. Maliki seems to have also manipulated Iraq's supreme court to rule in his favor several times. Furthermore, Maliki has been trying every way possible to somehow "legitimize" his bloc, which came in second in the elections, to form the next government. Maliki's bloc, State Of Law has formed an alliance with the National Alliance, the radical Shiite bloc. The alliance, was named the National Alliance hours before the first session of Parliament so al-Iraqyiah wouldn't enter the first session as the biggest bloc. Maliki's alliance with the  radical Shiite bloc had a bumpy start and remains in gridlock over which candidate they want for the Prime Minister post. The National Alliance remains under no leadership.

Recently, Iraqis marched down the streets protesting the lack of basic services such as drinking water and electricity. The protests, after taking place in five provinces, resulted in the resignation of the Minister of Electricity. The protests were seen by Maliki's State of Law as a movement to reduce Malki's popularity. Iraqi news networks reported today that Maliki  ordered to tighten security measures in Basra, the province where the protests started. The security forces have more presence in the province and their purpose is to "discourage" anymore protests. Deterring the protests doesn't remind me of anything but of Iraq's old days under Saddam Hussein.

Today, al-Arabiya news channel was raided be security forces from the Ministry of Interior. The channel staff was ordered to evacuate their office because of "threats that their office will be attacked." The staff was instructed to leave behind all their equipment and belongings in the office before the Ministry of Interior shut down their office. al-Arabiya has been known for its support of Ayad Allawi, the head of the winning Iraqyiah bloc and Maliki's rival for the Prime Minister post. al-Arabyia had interviewed Allawi a few days ago.

With one sign after the other, Iraqis are beginning to lose hope in Iraq's democracy. Maliki and his cronies have managed to take over all aspects of governance in Iraq. Their insistence on remaining in power has brought chaos back to the country and put the political process at stalemate. Almost four months after the elections, Malki still shows no signs of stepping down from his expired post and to transfer power peacefully. The change for which Iraqis voted is farther than it seemed on the night of the elections.

Power Hour

By: Ali Rawaf

A few days ago, I was one of the students complaining when my Spanish professor turned off the air-conditioning unit in the classroom so we can hear her better, “It is too hot,” I said.

“Go live in a third world country and you will know what it’s like to be without air-conditioning at all,” she retorted. Her response reminded me of home. Don’t get me wrong, we do have air-conditioning units in Iraq; they just don’t work most of the time.

Baghdad before 2003

After the assassination attempt on Saddam Hussein’s son in Baghdad in 1996, many believe that Saddam punished Iraqis by a couple of hours of power shortage a day. Gradually, the electric power hours of shortage were lessened. I can remember up to two years before the 2003 invasion, we experience very little power shortages in Baghdad.

As a result of American bombing to the power generating units in Iraq and the theft of the wires, cables, and other kind of electric equipment, we didn’t have electric power for a few days after April 9^th, 2003. When the service came back, we enjoyed for only two hours and it was gone for a few days and ever since, that has been one of themes of Iraqis’ daily life. It is a big mess. I really want to go into details because it explains a little of our daily frustrations, things that the most of the world don’t have to deal with. And a lot of Iraqis too didn’t have to deal with this issue as much prior to March of 2003.

We have named the different sort of electric power we get in Iraq. We have the “government electric power,” “the street generator,” and “the home generator.” The first provides us with two to four hours of electric power at random timings of the day. The second provides us with power for about eight to twelve hours a day. Iraqis have to pay those who own those big street generators. The owners are merciless; they charge ridiculous amounts of money. They turn their generators on and off as they please. Also, they receive government funding and government-provided diesel. The owners of these generators (some were stolen from government storage or government office buildings) have crowded the neighborhoods with webs of wires and cables. It would take a very long time to get rid of those wires. Not only are the ugly and chaotic looking, they also have caused many fires and other damage to the streets, light posts, and the electric regulating units on the streets.

The government sometimes gives only one hour of power a day so that is why Iraqis rely on the owner of the “street generator.”

One of the wire webs caused by the street generators in a Baghdad neighborhood

Picture was taken from Energy Tribune

Dec. 1, 2008

The home generator is another story. It is one of the appliances that an Iraqi house must have. They run on gasoline. Even though, we have a big oil wealth in Iraq, Iraqi still have to suffer waiting in long queues in the middle of the summer to get some gasoline to run those generators. The generators are loud, disturbing, and cannot cover the basic electric need for an Iraqi home.

Home Generators

Picture was taken from Los Angeles Times

March 2, 2008

The government keeps announcing “buying electricity” from Iran, Syria, Jordan, and Turkey, but none of that has shown any tangible results. The government also promises people of maintenance being done on the old (bombed and stolen) electric units.

We are an oil-exporting country and we suffer from power shortage and lack of gasoline. Yesterday, Fatima Kamal from the Iraqi newspaper, Azzaman titled her article, “Fuel consumption soars as power supplies dwindle in Iraq.” In it, she quotes an official in the Ministry of Oil, “Iraq would need to import more fuel to meet demand.” It is due to the “high increase in fuel consumption was mainly due to the erratic power supplies with blackouts reaching 20 hours a day,” said the official who requested anonymity.

Iraq’s fuel consumption has gone up 17 million liters a month. That is 4 million more liters than what was reported in recent months. The Iraqi government estimates about $5 billion needed to improve the electric supplies according to Azzaman. That’s if the Oil Ministry fulfills their promise that “its refineries should meet local fuel consumption within a year.”

Iraqi child studying under the "Lala" light. Lala is a little light lamp that runs on fire fuel.

Picture was take from FB group Iraqi Children