After Centuries of Discrimination, Iraqis of African Origin Want Rights

BAGHDAD, Iraq – After enduring centuries of racism -- since their ancestors landed as slaves on Arabian shores -- Iraqis of African descent  are fighting for recognition and rights.

The Movement of Free Iraqis (Ansar al-Hurriya), a group founded in 2009 to fight for the rights of Iraqi blacks which it estimates at  more than one million, complains that no one from the minority has been in any senior official position.

It is demanding a guaranteed seat in parliament, senior government posts for blacks and an end to lives as social outcasts.

To this day, dark-skinned Iraqis complain of having to endure racial slurs, and tribal leaders confess they forbid marriage to them. Dark skinned Iraqis from the south are still often called by their ancestral name, abeed, meaning slaves.

“Our members are over a million (in Iraq) and the government is not granting our political seats” in parliament, Ansar activist Ahmed al-Dosari told Rudaw. “If we insist on our rights we are subject to intimidation and assassination.”

Indeed, last April Ansar’s founder Jalal Ziab, under whose leadership Iraqi blacks had began to gain greater visibility and even some international notice, was assassinated by a gunman in Basra.

“The blacks were, and still are, marginalized and excluded from society and politics,” Ziab said in a 2009 television interview, explaining why his movement was needed. “Blacks are still viewed as inferior slaves. This view has been passed down through the generations.”

Dosari, who is fighting the same fight as the assassinated leader, complains that despite their larger numbers, Iraqi blacks do not have a fixed number of  seats in parliament, as do Christians, Mandaeans and some other minorities.

“We seek to be recognized as a minority in order to regain our robbed rights, and we demand a law to ban the word ‘slave,’ since slavery is over and we are Muslims and our religion emphasizes equality,” Dosari says.

The anger among the community is not new.

In the ninth century, thousands of slaves who were brought to Basra for hard labor mounted a revolt against their owners and set up their own government and capital.  The so-callled Zanj Rebellion, which lasted 15 years, is considered among the most dangerous and longest wars that the Abbasid Caliphate of the time had to face.

Jawad al-Bazuni, an MP from Basra province, denies that black Iraqis cannot participate in politics because of the color of their skin.
  

“They can participate in the elections and nominate their candidates with various political groups in the province,” Bazuni says, adding he does not object to blacks having a representative in parliament.

“It is necessary for blacks to integrate into society, because there is no one in Iraq standing against their rights and aspirations,” Bazuni advises.

In 2009, when Barack Obama became the first black US president, Ansar celebrated with a music festival in Basra. But the group faced a wave of criticism, accusing it of inciting racial divisions.

“We will not allow our rights to be taken away and we have the same dreams as US civil rights leader Martin Luther King,” says Haidar Majeed, a black member of Ansar. “Blacks in Iraq have rights and must achieve them peacefully, because we have not chosen the violent path,” he said.

“A unified black community would easily have enough votes to win at least one seat” on Basra’s Provincial Council, according to a document published on WikiLeaks from Ramon Negron, the director of the US Embassy’s regional office in Basra.

Political analyst Muhammad Faisal believes that groups like Ansar are inciting greater divisions in Iraq for personal political gain.

“They forget that dark skinned individuals are Iraqis who are integrated into society and people consider them brothers and regard them as equals,” he says.

“Whatever the color and features of citizens, they are all equal in this country and must gain their rights as deserved,” according to Faysal.

But Sheikh Hussein al-Ali, a tribal leader in southern Iraq, explained to  Rudaw that old customs, traditions and beliefs die hard.

“Islam has banned discrimination among Muslims, however tribal customs prevent us from intermarrying with them (blacks),” he explains.

“We acknowledge this is wrong but we can’t breach the customs and tradition.”