Kamil Al-Mahdi* assesses the challenges facing Iraq's new interim government The appointment of Iyad Allawi as interim prime minister for Iraq has all the hallmarks of a shameful climb-down by the United Nations Secretariat and a well-kept American secret. The United States only sought United Nations' help after it became obvious that its occupation of Iraq had become a costly failure and after the US administration embarked upon a damage limitation offensive in an election year. The UN was thus in a strong position as President Bush and the neo-conservatives needed to cover their retreat like never before. When the UN secretary-general's special envoy, Lakhdar Brahimi, came on his first mission to Iraq early this year he was met with mass demonstrations rejecting US plans for a handover of power to an assembly composed of unelected local caucuses. The caucus plan was abandoned together with plans for convening a constitutional assembly. Instead, a transitional constitution was announced against widespread popular opposition, including that of Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani. The transitional constitution consecrates sectarian divisions and imposes restrictions on the democratic process. Brahimi and the UN Secretariat set aside any reservations on the interim constitution and the envoy returned on his second mission aimed at consulting the Iraqi public with a view to naming an interim government with the authority of the UN invested in it. Brahimi's consultations were limited partly because of the security situation, but also because of opposition to the transitional constitution. Nonetheless, Brahimi articulated the views and concerns of many Iraqis when he stated that his mission was to select an administration of competent and honest technocrats who were not seeking political office and who would prepare the ground for early elections. Politicians were to acquire legitimacy not from US or UN appointment but in an open democratic political competition. Brahimi's statements were received with considerable hostility by many members of the now-disbanded Interim Governing Council (IGC); particularly Ahmed Chalabi who has enjoyed the support of the US Department of Defense and has coveted the top political post in Iraq. This hostility developed into personal attacks against Brahimi whose mission coincided with a virulent campaign spearheaded by Chalabi accusing the UN administration of the Oil for Food Programme of corruption and incompetence. On the other hand, the US administration and Bush personally continued to express confidence in Brahimi. Speculation about the leadership and composition of the interim Iraqi government to be named by Brahimi abounded, but Ahmed Chalabi was quickly discounted, especially in view of Brahimi's espousal of an independent and honest administration. However, the outcome confounded spectators when Brahimi agreed to the naming of Iyad Allawi as interim prime minister. Allawi is as far from Brahimi's image of an independent professional as anyone can be, and he is also said to have had strong business connections with US companies that are likely to seek opportunities in Iraq. Most significant are Allawi's apparent connections with US and British intelligence agencies. Himself a former Baathist of fairly senior rank until around the mid-1970s, Allawi surrounded himself almost entirely with former Baathist and security personnel. Along with others, he formed the Iraqi National Accord in 1990 which was involved in failed CIA sponsored coup attempts and which was accused of organising bomb attacks on civilian targets in Baghdad during the mid-1990s. While some other Iraqi exile groups were trying to break out of the old mould of Iraqi party politics, the INA remained firmly within that mould, thereby appealing only to those who would see a central role to an elite group linked to the military and intelligence services and who would seek to influence the political process through clandestine connections. Allawi's group developed strong relations with the Jordanian authorities and abandoned any remnant of their earlier commitment to an Arab nationalist ideology. They became completely pragmatic, focussed on power and an ideal vehicle for indirect US control of Iraqi politics. The INA is evidently well funded and has been using its funds to develop relations across a range of what it believes to be influential state and civil society institutions. It has also publicly opposed the de-Baathification campaign championed by Ahmed Chalabi and adopted by the US occupation administrator Paul Bremer. This has increased the group's attractiveness to former Baathists and military personnel. Allawi was given the chairmanship of the IGC's security committee, and therefore given charge of reforming the police and establishing a new army and intelligence apparatus. He and his brother- in-law, the IGC's first interior minister, argued for more resources to be directed towards central security forces and they appeared to have lost the argument until the Falluja and Sadr uprisings in April. Allawi's strong comeback and the removal of Chalabi and his protégés from many key positions is a major reversal in US occupation policy. Chalabi represented the Afghan model of a loose central administration and regional warlords with unencumbered commercial and financial interests masquerading as a liberal democracy. It represents an extremist Zionist dream and its reversal can only be welcome. The new government of Iyad Allawi presages a shift, however, towards attempting to recreate the prevalent Arab model of a centralised repressive government that is subservient to the United States and that is preoccupied with security. The political system will be pluralist only in form, and there are indications already that the coming elections will not be an open contest but that candidates have to be vetted in an opaque process. This would probably be achieved by the return of many Baathists to leading administrative, military and security positions, and by the increased expenditure on security that is one of the stated priorities of Allawi's administration. It is likely that a few show trials will be conducted to attempt to close the book on 35 years of brutality and corruption, and to focus attention away from the reality of continuing occupation. The new government has already presented its view of the relationship between US occupation forces and new Iraqi forces, and nothing in that guarantees Iraqi sovereignty, limits the activities of the occupation forces or states a specific time period for their presence in the country. The interim government is gambling on its ability to address the present chaos, lack of security and paralysis of public services, assuming that any success it can muster in these areas will compensate for the reality that formal Iraqi sovereignty will be encumbered by treaty obligations under UN sanction. The government will have a difficult task to show that this is not simply a continuing occupation with increased Iraqification of the violence. It is difficult to accept the selection of Allawi at its face value, an election by the IGC that forced the hand of Brahimi, or to take the rejection of Pachachi as an assertion of Iraqi will over American desire. Far from it, the hand of the US administration and the shadow of an American policy shift are all too present. The interim government is neither the professional body Brahimi said he wanted nor is it a product of the disbanded IGC. Instead, it appears to be a government that has some measure of both, but that also allows the US to pursue its revised military and security policy and the formal handover of power and international legitimacy. The government is unable to pursue major new policy directions that are appropriate for its interim character, yet it is expected not to reverse the radical initiatives of the occupation administration in economic and other matters. It remains to be seen whether Allawi's government will begin to function as a unified administration as distinct from the party dominated ministry fiefdoms under the IGC. Absent from its programme is a clear statement on the corruption that has been flourishing. As with the failed IGC, this government will be judged on whether it brings security and sovereignty to the Iraqi people, whether it acts to bring probity and efficiency to government and whether it permits a genuine democratic process. It will fall at the first hurdle if it signs a humiliating agreement with US occupation forces, with or without UN cover. * The writer is an Iraqi professor of political economy at Exeter University in the United Kingdom.
