As night falls, Sadrists brace for another day of sit-ins

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Supporters of influential Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr continue their weeks-long sit-in in Baghdad’s fortified Green Zone even hours after the eyes of the media leave the scene, keeping themselves entertained with music, food, sports, and each other’s company. 

Young men, all roughly in their early twenties or younger, are lined up to inspect those wanting to enter the Green Zone, in order to ensure the security of their fellow Sadrist supporters who are laying down inside the tents they have set up.

Echoing the same demands made by their leader for the dissolution of parliament, the protesters yearn for a complete reformation of the political scene in Iraq and demand a government free of corruption.

“God willing, [we are seeking] a change from the roots. Changing the parliament. Dissolving the parliament. A change from the roots to create a government with no more corruption,” 20-year-old Baqir Qasim, named after Sadr’s father-in-law Mohammed Baqir al-Sadr, told Rudaw English on Wednesday evening.

Each tent represents a separate parade or tribe, yet most of them offer free meals, fruit, and drinks to all the supporters equally. They queue in line for fresh bread, meat pies, pastries, and other goods, as they recharge their energy in preparation for another day in the scorching hot temperatures.

Others battle the boredom by grouping into teams and playing football matches between themselves, in front of the podium where local clerics have delivered “Friday of Unity” sermons since the start of the protests in late July, honoring a tradition initiated by Sadr’s father who united thousands of Shiites in weekly prayer as a symbol of opposition to former Iraqi dictator Sadam Hussein’s government.

The Sadrist Movement, which emerged from the October elections with the highest number of seats, withdrew from the parliament in June after a prolonged disagreement with rivals Coordination Framework, a pro-Iran Shiite faction, over the formation of Iraq’s next government.

Supporters of Sadr have held sit-in protests near the Iraqi parliament building since late July, decrying the delay in government formation and demanding snap parliamentary election after dissolving the current legislature.

“The protests of 2019 and the protests now are the same. We are all Iraqis demanding our rights,” Baqir claimed, “his eminence Sadr is an Iraqi citizen just like all of us and wants to rid the country of corruption.”

Muadh Abdulsalam, who graduated from surveying engineering over a year ago but now works as a Taxi driver due to lack of employment, felt differently towards the protests, saying that he was not optimistic about the demonstrations’ capability of producing real change in Iraq.

“There is no change. It is always the same people,” decried Abdulsalam, “I did not even participate in the elections. Nor did my family.” 

Thousands of Iraqis took to the streets in October 2019 in anti-corruption protests, resulting in early elections in October 2021. Nonetheless, the elected legislature has failed to form a new cabinet over 10 months later due to continued disagreements between the political blocs.