Good news from Iraq, part 31

The constitution drafting process is progressing well:

Although Iraqi lawmakers acknowledge that drafting a permanent constitution is one of the biggest challenges facing the country, the team charged with producing the document are cautiously optimistic that they will complete the job on time.

Lawmakers are up against an August 15 deadline to finish writing the constitution, a daunting task considering the disputes that have taken place so far even over who should sit on then 55-member drafting committee.

The drafting team now has to grapple with the controversial issues of federalism, the role of Islam in governance and the status of oil-rich Kirkuk.

“We hope that, God willing, things will go well and we’ll finish our work on time, particularly if we deal with the thorny issues in a way that satisfies all parties,” said Humam Hammoodi, head of the Constitutional Drafting Committee and a member of the ruling United Iraqi Alliance.

The committee, which was formed in mid-May, now meets every week and has divided into five groups each dealing with a different topic: the basic principles of the constitution, rights and liberties, laws and the formation of the state, federalism, and final principles.

“There are differing viewpoints among committee members, but this doesn’t mean there is no agreement at all among them,” said Sadi al-Barzinji, a committee member from the Kurdish Alliance. “Whatever the differences, they can be solved through democratic dialogue.”

As another story reports, "Humam Hamoudi, head of the committee to draft the constitution, said rapid and intensive meetings are underway with Sunni Arabs regarding possible disagreements. The meetings are meant to prevent a delay in the drafting of the constitution. He added the draft will be done with by August 1, as was decided earlier. He said they have agreed on many issues but there are still some contentious points, like federalism and the authority granted to the region's rulers." The Shia establishment is onboard too: "Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, head of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), has arrived in Najaf to meet top clerics to discuss the status quo of Iraq and the drafting of the constitution. The clerics agreed upon having all the different Iraqi spectrums participating in the drafting of the constitution and the political process with out marginalizing any of them."

But the constitution drafting process will soon involve consultation that goes well beyond the committee or even the National Assembly:

Baha' Al-'Araji, a member of the constitution drafting committee told Al-Mada paper yesterday that there are going to be 5 spots in each Iraqi province where citizens can find designated boxes where they can put their opinions and suggestion as to the process of writing the constitution.
Only Baghdad will be an exception due to its high population so there will be 5 spots in each main quarter in the capital.

One million "suggestion forms" are planned to be distributed nationwide soon and there will be specialized teams to read, sort the received forms and prepare summaries that will eventually be submitted periodically to the main committee.
He also mentioned-according to the paper-that the committee has already purchased air time on satellite channels and columns space on papers (ten in total) to publish/broadcast materials of value to constitutional education to help people get a better understanding of the process.

You can also read this short vox populi from the Iraqi street about the new constitution.

And there are other favorable signs for bigger future Sunni engagement in politics:

Several Sunni Muslim clerics have prepared a decree calling on members of Iraq's disaffected Sunni Arab minority to vote in coming elections and participate in the writing of a new constitution, a prominent Sunni leader said...

Adnan Dulaimi, who heads the Sunni Endowment, the government agency responsible for Sunni religious affairs, said the framers of the decree, or fatwa, would seek the support of other groups in the fractious Sunni community. If broadly embraced, Dulaimi and other Sunni leaders said,... the decree could pave the way to full political participation by a segment of Iraqi society that boycotted elections in January and has scant representation in the current government.

The push for the fatwa, together with formal approval by Iraq's National Assembly on Monday of the addition of 15 Sunnis to the committee writing the new constitution, suggested that slow and often contentious efforts to bring Sunni Arabs into the political sphere were beginning to bear fruit.

In another report: "Sunni clerics in Iraq are preparing to hold a general conference by the end of this week. The conference will include edicts to allow participations in the political process, the referendum on the constitution, and the coming elections. There will also be edicts that prohibit targeting the supreme election commission members in Baghdad and other provinces. The conference will ask all Iraqis to reject sectarianism and ethnicity and to stop targeting the clerics and men of thought, especially the Shia clerics."

Meanwhile, in the National Assembly, free-ranging debates make it the first for the Middle East:

Death or torture awaited members of the former rubber stamp parliament if they ever had the courage to criticize the former regime. Today the country’s elected deputies openly pour their wrath on government officials in open sessions which many Iraqis hail as harbinger of a new era.

It was not surprising therefore to see the deputies adding the presence of U.S. troops in the country to their agenda this week as well as corruption in government ministries and terror attacks.

“Iraq’s sovereignty is an issue of paramount importance … It is the responsibility of this assembly to take a decision whether to approve or reject the extension of the multinational forces in the country,” declared Abdulrahman al-Nuaimi.

While the deputies freely discussed the pros and cons of the presence of U.S.-led troops in Iraq, there were no calls for their immediate withdrawal under current circumstances.

More important for other deputies were issues related to the reports of massive corruption in government ranks and the escalating terror and insurgent activities in the country.

Chrenkoff

I posted this section of this long report as it has to do with the constitution writing process which I am following. Click the Chrenkoff link to read the entire thing. (hat tip) Iraq The Model

The last post in the constitution series