By Noreldin Waisy

Unfortunately the Kurdistan Parliament finally bowed to the demands of the conservative and retrogressive forces and passed a Constitution that doesn’t deserve a region that for many years has been proud of its democratic culture.

The draft of the Kurdistan Constitution, similar to the Iraqi Constitution, is filled with contradictions. For example, in Article 6, the Constitution says; "Islam is the main sources of legislations and no law should be passed that contradicts with Islam " But right after that is says that no law should be passed that contradicts with democracy!

The problem is that it is clear that Islam and democracy are two totally different programs. Islam is based on glorifying and never-changing elements, while democracy is a civilized program that is based on organizing lives of human beings by human beings and doesn’t glorify anything or anyone.

Except for some Islamic political parties that want to use democracy to get to power, most of the Islamic clerics agree that democracy is a man-made philosophy and should never be an alternative to divine program of Allah which is Islam.

Another point that I want to make about this draft of the Constitution is how Islam, a main source of legislation, and the draft deal with man and women. "Men and women are equal in front of law," the draft Constitution says. But the Islamic Sharia says something different; according to the Sharia men and women are not equal. For example two women are equal to one man in testimony and also two women get a share of one man in inheritance.

Democracy and secularism go hand in hand. They complete each other. If the Constitution of any region is not secularist and a religion, any religion, becomes a main source of legislation, that region should not be considered even a semi-democratic region.

This Constitution, that was passed by a Parliament that its mandate has been prolonged, was the last blow to democracy in Kurdistan and it will take Kurdistan back to the era of darkness.