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| Salahaddin Province Source: Wikimedia |
One provincial council member said the letter might have been revenge by supporters of the former governor Matshar Hussein Alawi. The provincial council kicked him out of office in September 2009. Alawi refused to step down, and the council elected a new governor Ahmed Abdul Jabbar Abdul Karim in his place. The controversy dragged on for months, which eventually led Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to become involved. In January 2010 he demanded that Alawi leave office, and sent troops to occupy the provincial council building until he did. That started a new problem as Maliki insisted that he name the new governor, not the council. As a show of power, Iraqi security forces would not allow anyone into the council building until a deal was made. Finally, in March the council and Maliki compromised and named a new governor, Khaled Hassan Mahdi Darraji. The deal was finalized when Maliki withdrew the security forces on April 1.
Now Darraji has been removed himself. The provincial council said he had been suspended for two months, and had one month to appeal his case to the Accountability and Justice Commission. There’s been no word on who will serve in his place.
The Iraqi Accordance Front led by the Iraqi Islamic Party, Iyad Allawi’s Iraqi National List, and Saleh al-Mutlaq’s Iraq National Project run Salahaddin. Together they hold 13 of the province’s 28 provincial seats.
SOURCES
Agence France Presse, “Iraq governor suspended for alleged Baath party affiliation,” 10/27/10
Aswat al-Iraq, “Salah al-Din governor sacked,” 10/26/10
2 comments:
If Iraqiya actually does go in for a Kurds + State of Law + Iraqiya, might they be in a decent position to block this sort of behavior by folks like Dawa?
I don't know. Iraq still has weak institutions. The security forces for example have multiple chains of command that aren't coordinate with some coming under the direct command of the premier and others answering to the Defense and Interior Ministries. That means a leader with the will can still do a lot of what they want as prime minister. I think it's going to be a while until that changes.
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