Maliki failed to achieve real national and communal reconciliation. He failed on services, he failed on security, and he became an enabler of corruption and a protector of the corrupt in his government. His government exacerbated sectarian and ethnic polarization in the country, and as a result of all of this, the political process continued to rot and decay. Patriotic and democratic Iraqis opposed to the occupation and sectarianism had warned against the consequences of this for Iraq’s unity and existence so many times that their voices went hoarse. ISIS and its allies’ takeover of the capital of northern Iraq and other cities, and the events of the past few days, is an official death certificate for the sectarian political process. Maliki has only two options now: Drown Iraq in a devastating and protracted civil war that no side will win; or – and this is the second option that I believe Maliki does not have the courage to pursue – end the sectarian political process and call a constitutional convention with the participation of all political forces and community leaders to amend the constitution and launch a national political process that would criminalize political sectarianism, and declare a secular and civil state based on the principles of citizenship rather than on confessional foundations, as the occupiers and their allies wanted. Otherwise, in a month or two, Maliki will still be peddling the same claims, except that thousands more Iraqis will have been killed, injured, or driven out from their homes, and many more cities will have been razed to the ground, while the unity of Iraq and its people will be up in the air.
Posted on: Sun, 29 Jun 2014 21:23:19 +0000
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