ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – With parliamentary elections due later this month in Iraq’s Kurdistan Region, MPs reflect on the raucous outgoing regional legislature, and wonder whether the new one will be any different.
“The parliament was full of disputes and heated debates,” said Sarwar Abdulrahman, from the Kurdistani bloc, which commands a parliamentary majority and comprises MPs from the autonomous enclave’s two ruling parties, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK).
“In this round of parliament it was all talk,” said Abdulrahman.” “Some parliamentarians would say irrelevant things only to show that they were active.”
The current 111-seat parliament, elected in 2009, has been known for furious differences and wars of words, with opposition MPs often loudly standing against bills proposed by the main bloc.
With their entry into the Kurdish parliament after the 2009 elections, opposition MPs -- mainly from the Change Movement (Gorran) -- brought a new kind of fight into the hall, such as booing the speaker, throwing water bottles at him and too often rejecting proposed bills.
Ruling party MPs and the people in Kurdistan were strangers to such scenes. Before the entry of a robust opposition, KDP and PUK parliamentarians would propose and pass bills unanimously.
Hazha Sileman, an MP from the Freedom and Social Justice bloc, said that the constant disagreement among parliamentarians impeded the passing of many necessary laws and legislation in the outgoing legislature.
Official statistics show that in the four-year term that is now coming to an end, the Kurdish parliament passed only 68 bills, compared to 83 bills in the second term of parliament that ended in 2009.
Nasik Tofiq, an MP from the opposition Islamic Union of Kurdistan, said that despite her party’s minority standing in parliament, its presence was important to oppose bad laws.
“It is true that the majority in parliament pass the laws, but our presence is good in the sense that we can try to change a bad clause at least,” she said.
Major disputes between the Kurdistani bloc and opposition parties have been over controversial laws over elections, demonstrations, the provincial administrations and the budgets given to the political parties by the ruling coalition.
“The task of the MPs in the new parliament will be much harder,” said Abdulrahman. “Many of the controversial laws still remain unresolved and we can only wait and see if the coming elections will change the make-up of parliament.”
Kurdish political parties are bracing for the September 21 parliamentary vote and official campaigning kicked off last week.
