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Iraqi president Jalal Talabani rejects provincial
election law
23.7.2008
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July
23, 2008
BAGHDAD, — Iraqi President Jalal Talabani has
rejected a provincial election law just a day after
it was
adopted by parliament,
a move that is almost certain to mean a delay in
municipal polls due in October.
"The president does not accept a law like this, a
law that 127 deputies voted on and which does not
represent even half of the parliament," his
Talabani's office said in a statement.
Iraq's 275-member parliament adopted the law in a
vote on Tuesday that was boycotted by Kurdish
lawmakers and some Shiite MPs.
"The president has confidence that the Presidency
Council will also not pass this law," the statement
said.
The three-member council, comprising President Jalal
Talabani, a Kurd, Shiite Vice President Adel Abdel
Mahdi and Sunni Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi,www.ekurd.net
has the right to veto
parliamentary legislation. |
Iraqi President : Jalal Talabani, a Kurd |
The law would allow voting in the country's 18
provinces later this year, originally scheduled for
October 1. But it now appears almost certain the
elections will be delayed.
A delay would be a blow to Washington and the
outgoing administration of President George W. Bush,
which sees the elections as a key step toward
national reconciliation among Iraq's divided
communities.
Parliament's main Kurdish bloc which has 54 members
in the assembly and some lawmakers from the powerful
Shiite Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council boycotted the
vote,www.ekurd.net
raising expectations
that the Presidency Council would reject the law.
But some MPs charged that the ballot was carried out
in secret, violating parliamentary bylaws.
The Kurds in particular have opposed the bill
because of disputes over how to constitute the
provincial council of Kirkuk, the northern oil
province claimed by both the Arabs and Kurds.
Kirkuk city is historically a Kurdish city
and it lies just south border of the Kurdistan
autonomous region, the population is a mix of
majority Kurds and minority of Arabs, Christians and
Turkmen. lies 250 km northeast of Baghdad. Kurds
have a strong cultural and emotional attachment to Kirkuk,
which they call "the Kurdish Jerusalem."
Article 140 of the Iraqi constitution is related to
the normalization of the situation in Kirkuk city
and other disputed areas.
The article also calls for conducting a census to be
followed by a referendum to let the inhabitants
decide whether they would like Kirkuk to be annexed
to the autonomous Iraqi Kurdistan region or having
it as an independent province.
These stages were supposed to end on December 31,
2007, a deadline that was later extended to six
months to end in July 2008.
The former regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein
had forced over 250,000 Kurdish residents to give up
their homes to Arabs in the 1970s, to "Arabize"
the city and the region's oil industry.
Copyright, respective author or news agency, AFP |
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