Wednesday Evening Iraq Parliament News Highlights 11-30-22

Its extension depends on the budget.. Committee: Parliament begins its legislative recess at the end of next week

2022-11-30 05:44   Shafaq News / The Parliamentary Legal Committee announced today, Wednesday, that the House of Representatives will enter the legislative recess at the end of next week, while indicating that the extension of the legislative term is linked to the arrival of the general budget law to the parliament.   Committee member Raed Al-Maliki told Shafaq News agency, "The first legislative year of the parliament will end at the end of next week, and that the parliament will enjoy its legislative recess for a period of 30 days."

He added, "Parliament may extend the legislative term again in the event that the general budget law for the year 2023 reaches the parliament," stressing that "the extension of the legislative term is linked to the arrival of the budget to Parliament."

And the Presidency of the House of Representatives decided, on November 8, 2022, to extend the second legislative term of the first legislative year of the fifth electoral session, by one month, while independent MP Hussein Al-Sabri explained that “the purpose of extending the legislative term is to pass the important laws on the Parliament’s agenda,

Among the most important laws that will be sent from the government to parliament is the general budget law, and in the event that the law arrives before the end of the legislative term on the ninth of next December, the parliament will extend its work again until the budget law is approved.   LINK

Parliament Without Legislation Since The Withdrawal Of The Sadrists And Is Preparing To Enter A New Recess

Posted On2022-11-30 By Sotaliraq   Baghdad / Firas Adnan                                                      

Parliament is currently preoccupied with deciding the presidencies of its committees before going to a new legislative recess on the ninth of next month, while it is indicated that no law has been enacted since the withdrawal of the Sadrist bloc in the middle of this year.

Parliament had suspended its work for about three months as a result of the storming of its building by Sadrist demonstrators, before it held its sessions again at the end of last September, while most of the Sadrist seats went to substitutes from the coordination framework.

“Parliament had extended its legislative term for a month, and this period is nearing its end, and it is not permissible, according to the constitution, to repeat the extension again,” said Thaer Makhaif, in an interview with Al-Mada.

He added, "The legislative recess will begin on the ninth of December, and will continue until the same day of the following month, after which Parliament will resume its work." He pointed out, "There are laws prepared by the parliamentary committees, some of which have passed the stage of the first reading and the other passed the second reading, and we are working to submit them to a vote."

And Makhaif stressed, "The committees will continue to perform their work during the legislative recess in order to end discussions on laws and draft them so that they are ready to be presented to Parliament when its sessions resume."

Regarding the reason why no law has been legislated since the Sadrist movement withdrew from Parliament, Makhaif replied, “Enacting laws is not an easy process, and there are objections to some paragraphs and discussions, in addition to the government withdrawing a number of projects that are not consistent with the ministerial curriculum.”

And he added, “The law, in order to be legislated, must be mature, and therefore we must remember that Parliament was paralyzed for months and was unable to exercise its role in legislation and oversight.” And Makhaif continues, “The real beginning of the parliament came with the formation of the government of Muhammad Shia al-Sudani on the 27th of last October.”

In his view, “the election of committee chairs did not affect the legislative process in parliament, given that the committees are currently managed by the oldest member.”

He concluded, "The coming period will witness an understanding between the political forces that formed the government in order to resolve the committees' file, and this will not be delayed for a longer period."

For his part, Representative Hussein Arab stated, "There is more than one meeting that was held at the headquarters of the First Deputy Speaker of Parliament, Mohsen Al-Mandalawi, regarding the committees." Arab continued, "There is almost agreement on resolving the distribution of presidencies, but some committees need time for discussion and discussion between the political blocs."

He expressed his belief that “the coming days will resolve these committees, especially the important ones such as the Security and Defense Committee, the Finance Committee and the Integrity Committee.”

And Arab finds, "The agreement on the presidencies of these three committees means that we are moving towards completing the rest of the committees in just one day."

And he stressed, “Parliament is determined to completely end this file before the end of the current legislative term, so that we can prepare to receive the budget law.”

And Arab continues, “There are other important laws awaiting parliament that have been included in the ministerial curriculum to be approved within a certain period not exceeding 6 months, such as the oil and gas laws, the Federal Supreme Court, and local and parliamentary elections.”

And he added, “Without the completion of committee presidencies and the status of their work, the process of passing laws in general will be difficult, especially with regard to controversial issues.”

Arab concluded, "Some of the laws are important and related to the political agreement. They need a role for the concerned committees, and not to name their presidencies, because the process of passing them is very difficult."

It is noteworthy that the parliament in its current session succeeded in passing two laws before the withdrawal of the Sadrists, namely the law criminalizing normalization with the Zionist entity and the law of emergency support for food security and development.   LINK

The "Forces Of Change" Criticize The Ministerial Platform Of The Sudanese Government And File Complaints Against The Killers Of The Demonstrators

2022-11-30 05:54   Shafaq News/ The Forces for Democratic Change in Iraq criticized, on Wednesday, the ministerial platform of the federal government headed by Muhammad Shia' al-Sudani, the Prime Minister, revealing at the same time that legal complaints had been filed against the killers of the demonstrators of the October 2019 protests.

This came in a press conference held by the Forces for Change today, in which the Secretary-General of the Iraqi Communist Party, Raed Fahmy, read a statement issued by those forces.

Fahmy renewed during the conference, "The position of opposition to the quota approach according to which this government was formed, and is being enshrined in all state institutions, not according to competence, integrity, and specialization, but according to partisan loyalties and political favoritism. Through appointments to higher positions and special grades."   sequel..   LINK

An Expected Clash With The Factions Because Of The “Article 140 Committee” And The Possibility Of Replacing Its Head, Al-Amiri

Posted On2022-11-30 By Sotaliraq   Baghdad / Tamim Al-Hassan  On the eve of the departure of Prime Minister Muhammad al-Sudani to Tehran, the political forces reached advanced understandings on 3 sensitive files, some of which have been pending for 15 years, in addition to the Iranian threats on the borders.

In the presence of all parties to the State Administration Coalition, which formed the last government, there was almost agreement on the mechanism for holding local elections, completing the cabinet, and activating Article 140.

The last item may spark a political crisis, especially with the Turkmen objection to “not including them in the understandings,” and an expected clash with the factions that control the “disputed areas.”

A statement issued by the State Administration Coalition said on Monday evening that the meeting: "revealed high-level dialogues and meetings to prevent the violation of Iraqi sovereignty from any external party."

The coalition stressed, according to the statement, Iraq's serious work to prevent the use of its lands as a springboard to destabilize the security of neighboring countries.

And the statement continued, “The meeting decided to complete the cabinet and name the ministers of environment, housing and construction.” The coalition also listened to a comprehensive report on “the provincial elections law and the House of Representatives, while the details of the law were discussed from the political and technical sides.”

Meanwhile, the Prime Minister stressed, yesterday, not to allow the use of Iraqi lands to threaten Iran's security.

Al-Sudani said in a press conference he held with Iranian President Ibrahim Raisi in Tehran, shortly after his arrival in the Islamic Republic, that "Iraq does not forget Tehran's support for it since 2003 and the war against ISIS terrorist gangs."

According to leaks, Tehran had given Iraq until early December to control what it says are Kurdish militants attacking Iran from Kurdistan before the Islamic Republic carries out a ground attack on opposition headquarters.

And Shiite parties considered that Tehran's provocation of the problem of the Kurdish opposition at this time and the implementation of missile attacks and marches is a pretext to put pressure on the new government, which has shown rapprochement with Washington.

Those parties also indicated that Tehran or its affiliates in Iraq were behind the assassination of the American citizen Stephen Troll more than two weeks ago in the center of Karrada at the hands of unknown persons, while Al-Sudani had considered the incident “intentional.”

Al-Sudani stressed from Tehran that “the government is committed to implementing the constitution and not allowing the use of Iraqi lands to disturb security against Iran,” noting that “we depend in our foreign relations according to the principle of mutual respect and non-interference in internal affairs.”

Al-Sudani had attended the expanded meeting that took place on Monday evening, at the house of the late President Jalal Talabani in Baghdad, along with Muhammad al-Halbousi, Speaker of Parliament, Nuri al-Maliki, leader of the State of Law, and the rest of the leaders of the blocs.

According to informed sources who spoke to (Al-Mada), “the meeting discussed the activation of the Article 140 Committee, and touched on holding the referendum in the regions outside the region in the Nineveh Plain, Kirkuk, and Khanaqin.”

The source familiar with what happened in the meeting confirmed that “the leaders of the political forces differed over the implementation of the referendum in the areas of Jassan and Badra in Kut and some other areas in Diyala.”

After the meeting, Minister of Justice Khaled Shawani, who was present at the meeting, said that “by a decision of the Prime Minister, it was decided to form the Supreme Committee for the implementation of Article 140, which was suspended in 2014.”

He added on his Facebook page that “the committee will meet within ten days, to prepare an estimated budget to compensate those covered by the article, and to submit it to the Council of Ministers for inclusion in the general budget.”

Shawani said that the decision to activate Article 140 “was taken based on what was stated in the ministerial platform within the framework of the political agreement concluded by the political leaders to form the government.”

Article 140 of the constitution states:

First: The Executive Authority shall take the necessary steps to complete the implementation of the requirements of Article (58) of the Law of Administration for the Iraqi State for the Transitional Period, with all its paragraphs.

Second: The responsibility placed on the executive authority in the transitional government, stipulated in Article (58) of the Law of Administration for the Iraqi State for the Transitional Period, extends and continues to the executive authority elected under this constitution, provided that it is fully accomplished (normalization, census, and ends with a referendum in Kirkuk and other disputed areas to determine the will of its citizens) within a maximum period of the thirty-first of December of the year two thousand and seven.

And the sources confirm that “holding a referendum in the disputed areas will certainly lead to a clash with the factions that have controlled those lands since 2016, because the activation of the article will threaten their presence there.”

The sources suggested that "the committee that will work to implement the provisions of Article 140 will choose a new president to replace the current president, Hadi al-Amiri (leader of the Fatah Alliance)."

The Committee for the Implementation of Article 140 is defined as the one that was subjected to demographic change and Arabization policy at the hands of Saddam Hussein's regime, during the period from 1968 to 2003.

The last article provided for three phases: the first is normalization, which means restoring the conditions of the population to what was before the era of the Baath Party, the second is the population census, and the last is the referendum on joining the region.

Committees were formed to implement the provisions of Article 140, under the government of Ibrahim al-Jaafari. The chairmanship of the committee was entrusted to Hamid Majid Musa, and when Nuri al-Maliki took over the government, another committee was formed headed by former Minister of Justice Hashem al-Shibli, but he resigned from his position, then was replaced by Raed Fahmy in 2007.

The presidency of the committee, which was reconstituted in 2011, was entrusted to Hadi al-Amiri, then Minister of Transport in the Maliki government, but the Arab parties in Kirkuk had objected to al-Amiri's appointment.

On the other hand, the Turkmen objected to the activation of Article 140, and the Turkmen Front, which is the political umbrella for the component, confirmed in a statement, “its rejection of any step taken in the absence of the component’s representatives.”

And she added, "Since the first day of the negotiations to form the state administration coalition, there has been a political will to absent and weaken the role of the Turkmen component."

The front called on: “The leaders of the blocs who hold their meetings in the absence of the Turkmen component should not forget the pure and pure blood that the Turkmen offered throughout the history of the Iraqi state to preserve the unity of Iraq.”

Regarding the Kurdish issue, Harim Agha, head of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan bloc, said in an interview with (Al-Mada) that "the meeting witnessed the completion of the rest of the vacant ministries in the government."

And Agha said, "The Ministry of Construction, Housing and Municipalities has gone to the Kurdistan Democratic Party, in exchange for the National Union obtaining the Ministry of Environment."

According to leaks, the Minister of Construction is the former Minister Benkin Rikani, and the Minister of Environment is Nizar Amidi, while it is likely that the candidates will be presented to Parliament during the next two days.

In the last meeting, the sources who attended the meeting revealed that “the leaders of the political forces have agreed to adopt the St. Lego system in the provincial council elections expected to be held in October 2023, and the possibility of using the same system in the event of an agreement to hold early legislative elections.”

And “St. Lego” as amended had been withdrawn in the last elections (Legislative 2021) in favor of the multiple constituency law.

This system depends on dividing the votes of the winners by 1.9, which leads to crushing the results of the small powers that aspire to win.  LINK