Controversy Swirls Around Baghdad as Member of Parliament Calls for President's Ouster

Posted by Juan Cole, Informed Comment at 8:45 AM on July 28, 2008.

Al-Hayat reports in Arabic that a controversy is raging in the Iraqi parliament about the veto exercised by Iraqi President Jalal Talabani against a bill passed last week enabling elections in the fall. MP and former court judge Wael Abd al-Latif of the State Party charged that the veto was "unconstitutional." He said that when a bill is vetoed, it has to go back to parliament for another vote, and needs a 3/5s majority to overturn the veto. Abd al-Latif also pointed to the constitution's requirement that the presidential council act through consensus. In this case, Talabani and Adel Abdul Mahdi vetoed the bill while their colleague, the other vice president, Tariq al-Hashimi, was out of town! He should have been consulted about appointing a proxy to vote for him but was not.

A member of the Sunni fundamentalist Iraqi Accord Front, Khalaf al-Ulyan, called for Talabani to be removed from the presidency, on the grounds that his veto derived from ethnic solidarity rather than from a concern to act on behalf of the entire Iraqi nation. On Saturday, Talabani consulted with Massoud Barzani, President of the Kurdistan Regional Government, on the crisis. The bill had contained a provision apportioning power in Kirkuk province equally among Arabs, Turkmen and Kurds, while Kurds claim to be the majority there.

Al -Zaman reports in Arabic that female member of parliament on the Sadrist list, Maha al-Duri, charged that the Kurdistan Alliance and the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq have a secret alliance whereby they outmaneuver other parties in their quest to impose a very loose form of federalism on Iraq. The Sadrists want a strong central government and the end of US military surveillance in Iraq.

Juan Cole teaches Middle Eastern and South Asian history at the University of Michigan and is author of the forthcoming "Napoleon's Egypt: Invading the Middle East."