After Kurdish vote, time to quit media, time to lose faith in humanity

On September 25 I was in the newsroom putting together people’s thoughts about the Kurdish vote on independence when I unexpectedly came across a video footage of my own father speaking to a Rudaw reporter in my hometown of Halabja. My father, who spent seven years in exile, a year in the notorious Abu Ghraib prison, and had lost his lifesavings at least three times due to Iraq’s cyclic conflicts, was saying to the reporter that he would happily vote for independence since this was perhaps his last chance to have a say on Kurdistan’s future before he dies. For many who do not know my father this emotional moment might go unnoticed. I was sad and angry that my dad, a veteran Peshmerga, may not see an independent Kurdish state in his lifetime, but I had no doubt that I would see that day.  

Three weeks later, and once again in the newsroom, I was watching Live on television Peshmerga fighters crying and begging their commanders to stay on and fight the Iraqi forces advancing on Kirkuk, our beloved Jerusalem. At that point I truly felt like even I may never see an independent Kurdistan.

Nothing had prepared me for that day, neither my training at one of the world’s best journalism schools in London, nor the year-long reporting on death and destruction of Mosul, nor the tragic history of my own hometown where thousands had died of betrayal and abandonment.

I watched our dream of independence dash before my own eyes while suppressing my anger so as to report it to the outside world, though I was sure it would be one of the darkest moments in our history. I felt devastated. I stayed at my desk and worked round the clock partly because we were short-staffed and also because I could not sleep anymore. I was afraid of sleeping. I worked more than 40 hours, and when I went home for a few hours of rest, I returned to the office shortly afterwards and covered the news for another 24 hours.

Since October 16, I wake up with a lot of confusion and the feeling of the world having turned upside down. It takes me at least an hour before I decide where the Peshmerga are, where the world stands, and what I am doing. It is a nightmare. It’s like carrying a terrible shame for the rest of your life. All those who died for freedom were let down, not by the Kurds alone, but by humanity.

The scene in Kirkuk brought back to me the memory of those thousands of innocent people who died from the 1988 gas attack, and that of young Mohammed who lost his mind after losing two dozen family members in a day.

This disaster in Kirkuk and other areas raised a serious question in my mind: Did we in the Kurdish media, including me, do all we could to tell the world why millions of people no longer wanted to live with a country that had committed genocide against them.

I am proud of my team at Rudaw English for doing whatever they could to convey the Kurdish perspective in a professional way. We double-checked stories, tried to verify them before posting, and so many times did we kill stories we thought came from unreliable sources.

As for myself, my time log didn’t change that much before and after the referendum. Many days I worked many extra unpaid hours, sometimes even a full second shift. I later used that to comfort myself that we did all we could to tell the story of the referendum, which I personally dubbed the Question of the Century.

At Rudaw English, we are proud to have done our coverage of this historic Kurdish day objectively and tried to convey both the Iraqi and Kurdish perspective. I’m happy that we covered every speech and remark of Iraq’s Prime Minister Abadi, as we did the same for the Kurdish President Barzani.

So whatever went wrong on October 16, I am truly convinced that it was not the fault of the media. It was the fault of the world who despite being fully aware of our dreams and aspirations decided to turn a blind eye, and even worse still, blame the victim, those who dared to dream of freedom.

As President Barzani said, the vote was to choose between freedom and subjugation. But it soon turned out we had to choose between death or subjugation. Death if you voted leave, and subordination if you ignored the vote.