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Iraq
A handout picture released by Iraqi Prime Minister's Media Office shows Iraqi prime minister-designate Mohammed Tawfiq Allawi giving a televised speech in Baghdad on February 19, 2020. Photo: Iraqi Prime Minister's Press Office / AFP
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Iraq’s parliament has postponed a vote on whether to approve Prime Minister-designate Mohammed Tawfik Allawi’s new cabinet until Saturday after the legislature failed to meet quorum on Thursday.
Just 120 MPs turned up to the session in Baghdad – shy of the 165 needed to meet quorum. Kurdish and Sunni parties seem to have deliberately avoided the session, alongside some Shiites, because they are worried Allawi intends to exclude their choice of candidates from power.
Mohammed al-Halbousi, the parliamentary speaker, did not receive Allawi when he arrived at the parliament on Thursday – a telling sign. Instead he was met by first deputy speaker Hassan Kaabi, a member of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr’s bloc, which strongly backs Allawi.
According to Iraqi state media, speaker Halbousi had earlier urged parliamentary blocs to postpone the session until Saturday due to a disagreement between the speakers.
“There was a disagreement that occurred between the speaker and the first deputy. The first deputy said there was quorum if MPs entered the parliament hall, and that the speaker had rushed to say there was no quorum. The speaker told him then we would wait a couple more hours until quorum was met, but the quorum was not met,” Basheer Khalil, the second deputy speaker, told Rudaw.
Ahmed Safar, secretary of the Iraqi parliament’s finance committee, told Rudaw: “Today, only [Sadr’s] Sayirun bloc, some independent MPs, and some other blocs went into the parliament hall to make the session happen. We Kurds didn’t go. The Sunnis didn’t go, and some Shiite blocs as well.”
Kurdish parties held a meeting in the parliament on Thursday to discuss their united position and decided to boycott the session. They also met with Allawi but failed to reach an agreement.
“We as Kurds honestly don’t have a personal problem with him [Allawi] or his ministers. First, his manifesto is not realistic because the things in them are impossible to achieve in a year because this is an interim government. It seems as though he believes his cabinet is going to stay for four or five years,” Safar said.
“In his manifesto, he has made no mention of the Kurdistan Region as a federal entity within Iraq. He deals with it as though it is like any other Iraqi province,” he said.
“We want two things from him, and if he gives us assurances, then we will vote for him. First, he has to give us guarantees that the financial entitlements of the Kurdistan Region are not put at risk, for him to make this part of his manifesto, for him not to cut them, and second, we want him to treat the Kurdistan Region as a region with its own status as stipulated by the constitution,” Safar added.
A point of contention between the Kurds and Allawi has been the PM-designate’s insistence upon choosing his cabinet ministers himself. Kurds have argued that the Kurdish Region itself needs to send Kurdish ministers to Baghdad due to its special status.
“One of the main things for us is that the Kurdistan Regional Government, the Kurdistan Region, as a constitutional, legal entity has its presence and needs to be treated with respect. The federal government needs to take into consideration all the legal and constitutional rights of the Kurdistan Region and its people,” Jwan Ihsan, head of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) faction in the parliament, told Rudaw.
Ihsan said contentious issues such as the disputed territories and their security administration are also not mentioned in the manifesto.
Speaking to Rudaw on Thursday, Mudhir al-Khazaal, a Sayirun MP, threatened that if no agreement was reached by Saturday, they will go ahead with a vote regardless.
“Parliamentary blocs supportive of Allawi will go for a vote and meet the quorum on Saturday,” Khazaal said, threatening a majoritarian approach to the issue.
Sabah Tiloubi, another Sayirun MP, told Iraqi state media that Kurdish complaints will not be resolved through boycotts.
“Kurdish demands haven’t changed since 2003 up to now, and they have to be present in today’s meeting to vote in the government since a boycott won’t resolve issues,” Tiloubi said.
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