The events of October 2019 are a warning shot about the protesters' ability to turn the situation around

“Popular anger” is enough to eliminate the imbalance in the governance of Iraq

• Iraqis have taken to the streets to protest against corruption, the ineffectiveness of the government, and the lack of any prospects.

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• Al-Kazemi said that he entered the position of prime minister in the worst circumstances any predecessor had known.

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On October 1, 2019, young Iraqis took to the streets to protest against corruption, the ineffectiveness of the government, and the lack of any prospects. To begin with, the response of the government headed by Adel Abdul-Mahdi was excessive force. Iranian-backed militias opened fire on protesters, killing about 600 people. The crowds grew, along with the Iraqi people's anger over these repressive behaviours. In the end, Adel Abdul-Mahdi resigned.

After several false starts, the opinion of the political leaders settled on Mustafa Al-Kazemi, a former human rights researcher and journalist whom former Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi had appointed as head of the Iraqi National Intelligence in 2016, in light of the fight against ISIS.

The Iraqi political elite believes that Al-Kazemi was a right choice to head the government, as he remained clean in a system dominated by corruption, and he has good relations with everyone from the Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani to the Kurdish leader Massoud Barzani, and when he was in the position of head of national intelligence, he proved that he is a competent administrator.

weak

Although Al-Kazemi was important to the politicians who chose him, he did not have the appropriate charisma among many famous political figures, and he was politically weak, and he did not have the permanent support of one of the political blocs in Parliament.

But Al-Kazemi’s authority was based on one mission: to put an end to the imbalance and weakness that Iraq suffers from, to supervise fundamental reform, and to lead Iraq through new elections.

During a year and a half of his transitional leadership, Al-Kazemi failed.

The cards that the political system puts in its hands have always been weak.

The Iraqi electoral system has long been characterized by controversy.

CPA Administrator Paul Bremer and UN officials had agreed to elections governed by proportional representation, nominations based on party lists, not constituencies.

Their goal was to achieve speed.

But the regime's encouragement of long-term instability was evident, and the candidates owed their political survival to party leaders, not to accountability and constituencies. Given that the would-be candidates were working to curry favor with the political leaders who would decide who was on the electoral roll, they were vying to be more hawkish about their ethnicity and sect than their peers. As Iraqis began toying with the electoral system to vote on a provincial, rather than a national, basis, the same dynamic remained.

After the outbreak of protests and the resignation of Abdul-Mahdi, the Iraqi president, Barham Salih, proposed fundamental reforms that, if implemented, would help stabilize Iraq.

Al-Kazemi did not use his powers to nurture them. Rather, parliamentarians chose the old system that encouraged nepotism and corruption, and emptied the reforms of any real meaning.

These days, the same political leaders engage in the same bargains, in order to enrich and strengthen themselves, while ignoring the Iraqis they claim to represent.

no support

Al-Kazemi entered the government without the support of any large bloc, and with the support of ordinary Iraqis, who saw in him the last hope. At the same time, the political elites were against the protest movement because they felt afraid of it. Perhaps Al-Kazemi took advantage of this to his advantage. Needing the support of political leaders in order to remain in office after the elections, he worked to get close to them. Instead of clashing with Barzani, for example, he approached him by surrender, rather than the ordinary Iraqis. Accordingly, the Iraqi street has now lost.

Perhaps the White House and the US intelligence are impressed by Al-Kazemi's promises that he will put an end to the Iraqi militias backed by Iran, but behind the scenes he is subject to these militias like the rest of his predecessors from the heads of government.

The demonstrations and even the assassination attempts against them define the red lines that Al-Kazemi should not cross.

The biggest problem that limits Al-Kazemi’s efforts to rein in threats to Iraqi sovereignty is not only fear, but ambition, because if he collides with Iran, this will undermine his hope of gaining the support of political movements backed by Tehran.

worst conditions

Al-Kazemi honestly says that he entered the position of prime minister in the worst circumstances known to any prime minister before him from those who held this position.

Haider al-Abadi, during his tenure of office, focused on cautious reform as a base for investment and growth.

In 2003, the population of Iraq was 25 million, and by 2014, when al-Abadi took power from Nouri al-Maliki, the population of Iraq was close to 35 million.

And the head of Al-Abadi's office, Nofal Al-Hassan, warned of the risks arising from the inflation of salaries in Iraq, and its inability to provide jobs in the non-oil sector.

But Abdul-Mahdi's team didn't care much. At a time when oil prices were soaring, he ignored the reforms and started handing out civil service jobs like sweets.

During his first year in office, for example, his electricity minister added tens of thousands of jobs to the payroll, without any sustainable means of paying them, and without any noticeable improvement in services.

Al-Kazemi faced difficulties to compensate for the shortfall in the salary funds left by Abdul-Mahdi due to the lack of efficiency, if not because of the thefts of the team working with him.

Al-Kazemi now boasts to his visitors that he has increased the revenues of the non-oil sector.

In fact, what saved Al-Kazemi and his government was not the successful reforms that he had undertaken, but rather the rise in oil prices.

At the same time, the population is rising.

By the end of the current decade, the Iraqi population will be about 50 million, and if oil prices fall, it will be a disaster for the government.

Warning shot

The events of October 2019 served as a warning shot at the anger of protesters who were ready to give Iraq's leaders a chance for reform.

It seems that Al-Kazemi has missed the opportunity.

But the second revolution of anger will be violent and will not discriminate between parties, and will lead to an immigration crisis, just as the rulers of Kurdistan are now facing this reality.

The Biden administration can continue to treat Iraqi politics as a game of musical chairs, but these days it lacks the big picture of the situation.

Michael Rubin ■ is a researcher at the American Enterprise Institute

Translation: Hassan Abdo Hassan ■ for «The National Interest»

Although Al-Kazemi was important to the politicians who chose him, he did not have the appropriate charisma, was politically weak, and did not have the permanent support of one of the political blocs in Parliament.

The biggest problem that limits Al-Kazemi’s efforts to rein in threats to Iraqi sovereignty is not only fear, but ambition, because if he collides with Iran, this will undermine his hope of gaining the support of political movements backed by Tehran.

• The Biden administration can continue to treat Iraqi politics as a game of musical chairs, but these days it lacks the big picture of the situation.

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