Day of Rage

I wrote a few weeks back about what the US was doing in Iraq, with the intent to follow that up with my thoughts on what Iraq was doing in Iraq. In the interim, democratic fervor broke out across the Middle East and led me down a different path for the last entry. Since that story line continues unabated, I reckon I'm going to have to sort of blend the two concepts to provide a better perspective for what is going on here.

To set the stage, I'll lay out the basics of the first issue, what Iraq is doing in Iraq. It was almost one year ago (March 7, 2010) that Iraqis went to the polls to elect their first truly sovereign government since the coalition invasion in March of 2003. Participation was robust, representing more than 60% of eligible voters and all ethno-sectarian groups, and legitimate, having endured microscopic scrutiny from scads of international monitors.

Unfortunately, it took nine more months to finally form the elected government, and even that is not wholly true, since the most powerful ministries (Defense, Interior, and National Defense) remain under the Prime Minister, who has not deemed any candidates worthy as of yet. On the heels of this stalemate comes a somewhat shocking decision by the Federal Supreme Court to place a number of "independent" government bodies under the control of the PM instead of the Council of Representatives (roughly equivalent to Congress). Two of these independent bodies are the Integrity Commission and the Independent High Electoral Council (overseers of elections). This action, together with retention of control of the security ministries, has many Iraqis concerned about "another Saddam."

Intrigue aside, the formation of the rest of the government generated a lot of activity in the diplomatic and economic realms. Iraqi officials were flying all over the region visiting fellow diplomats, who were equally bent on coming here to visit. The Arab League Summit, planned for Baghdad but long considered in jeopardy because of security concerns and lack of government formation, suddenly drew advocates from across the region. More oil and gas deals were cut, oil production started creeping up, and all indicators were that Iraq was opening up for business.

There is still too much violence -- the zombies work hard to sustain the body count and are always looking for easy targets, typically crowds of pilgrims or market shoppers. The Iraq security forces are leaning hard on these guys, forcing them to find paths of least resistance and further contributing to the belief that they are an oozing sore on the skin of humanity.

All of that has now been overtaken by events. The toppling of the Tunisia and Egyptian rulers quickly became a regional movement to displace suppressive autocratic regimes. Though Iraq has what the rest of them want, which is representative government, they still feel they have plenty to gripe about and they have busily been doing just that for two weeks.

Unlike the regime change sought elsewhere, the issues in Iraq are, so far, more local. Corrupt officials, lack of jobs, and meager basic services such as electricity, clean water, and garbage removal. Demonstrations of widely varied sizes crop up each day in different cities and provinces. Sometimes the protesters misbehave and sometimes the security forces do as well. Protesters throw rocks and set fire to government buildings, security forces shoot some of them. There is considerable tension. And growing cohesiveness among the disenchanted.

There is not much Internet access yet in Iraq, but social media combined with very robust cell phone ownership combined to gradually direct broad interest to this Friday, the 25th of Feb. It is dubbed the Day of Rage. I, largely due to proximity, am not a big fan of the adoption of such a mean-spirited
moniker, but there it is and here it will soon be.

It is impossible to guess how this will play out. The Iraqis are justifiably upset with the lack of attention their elected government opted to bestow upon them, but must be aware at some level that no miracles will happen overnight no matter who is in charge. These folks all need to engage in some meaningful dialogue, quickly followed by some equally meaningful actions that clearly display honest intent and a credible plan for improvement over time.

Should make for a very interesting day.