All six ministers from Iraq’s largest Sunni bloc tendered their resignation from Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s coalition government on Wednesday following a month-long spat.
The decision by the National Concord Front effectively ends any claim by the Shi’ite-dominated coalition to be a government of national unity, and strikes another blow at Iraq’s already faltering programme of national reconciliation.
”The Front announces its withdrawal from the government of Nuri al-Maliki and the deputy prime minister and the ministers will submit their resignation today [Wednesday],” said Rafie al-Issawi, Minister of State for Foreign Affairs.
Issawi made the announcement at a press conference held inside Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone as Iraq’s Sunni Vice-President, Tareq al-Hashemi, and other senior members of the bloc stood behind him.
Hashemi will remain vice-president and the bloc’s 44 parliamentarians will return to the National Assembly in September after its summer recess, where they will swell the already growing ranks of the opposition.
Maliki still has the support of his own Dawa Party and the Kurdish bloc, but his hopes of maintaining a parliamentary majority will rest on independent Shi’ite deputies and the powerful Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council (SIIC).
When Parliament returns all eyes will be on the Shi’ite SIIC to see if the party will continue to prop up Maliki’s faltering government or attempt to win the premiership for one its own champions.
”The Front will remain active in the political process hoping that it will be reformed and that sectarian and ethnic divides will disappear,” Issawi said.
But he warned that ”if the other political parties are not serious, we will rethink the feasibility of our participation in the whole political process”.
Sami al-Askari, an MP from the Shi’ite United Iraqi Alliance and an advisor to Maliki, said he regretted the Front’s decision.
”This is not positive development. Our brothers in the Concord Front should have postponed this decision, especially because some of their demands have nothing to do with the government,” he complained.
The announcement caps a month-long struggle between the Sunni bloc and Maliki’s Shi’ite-led government, one that became particularly bitter last week when the Front threatened withdrawal if its demands were not met.
The Front has accused the government of failing to rein in Shi’ite militias and of the arbitrary arrest and detention of Sunni citizens, but on Wednesday leaders seemed to leave the door open for future discussions.
”Our central and historic goal is reform. We will reconsider the withdrawal tomorrow if they review our demands,” Hashemi said. — AFP
