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Kurds Crying Out for Change
15.2.2007
By Peshraw Hamid. Translated by Dr Kamal Mirawdeli -
The contents of this article reflect the author’s
personal opinions
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February 15, 2007 -
Kurdistan region (Iraq)
1) Questions and questions to those Kurdish
officials who do not have ears
Introduction:
The article I have translated below is one of
hundreds of similar articles that have been and are
being written and published by young people on
independent Kurdish websites and even in many local
independent newspapers in Kurdistan. There are also
hundreds of rational articles, analyses, ideas and
proposals presented to Kurdish government and party
officials. Last year the frustration of Kurdish
people resulted in mass demonstrations almost in
every city and town, a very sad and terrifying
climax of which was the burning of Halabja monument.
This was the extreme example of the extreme anger of
our people at the corruption and criminality of the
two ruling establishments of south Kurdistan. I
honestly thought that after this incident the
officials of PUK at least must be thinking of
suicide or leaving Kurdistan for good. It is
shocking that it was not just business as usual but
the matters became much worse developing into a kind
of corrupt primitive fascism with harassing and
persecuting of journalists, imprisonment of young
people and turning corruption and building family
empires and mafias into an accepted normal way of
government and practice of power.
There were so-called party elections within PUK in
which all candidates admitted that they were paying
hundreds of thousands of dollars to buy votes
without anyone explaining where this money came
from. No less a figure that Talabani himself used
and sanctioned this process as he himself made many
formal statements in which he promised that he would
keep salaries and privileges of all party officials
whether they would lose or win the ‘elections’, of
course as long as they supported his own party
family empire. Yes, in Kurdistan parties control all
finances and they pay their members and cadres to be
servants of their leaders!!!
Recently Talabani proudly told a French newspaper
that there are 20 dollar billionaires in his
stronghold city of Sulaymani alone and there are
thousands of millionaires. But there were no
billionaires and only less than a dozen millionaires
before the fall of Saddam in 2003. What hatched
these billionaires and millionaires? Shouldn’t this
question be asked and legally pursued by parliament
or an international body while there are hundreds of
thousands of anfal women suffering from poverty and
starvation? While after four years the displaced
people of Kirkuk still watch their children dying of
cold and hungers living in makeshift accommodation
in derelict buildings and a stadium in Kirkuk, in
the middle of mountains of rubbish, lacking hygiene,
water, electricity , health care and education for
their children? While a whole generation of Kurdish
youth are alienated and ruined without jobs and
hopes? While there is no productive activity left in
Kurdistan whatsoever and everything including bread
and eggs is borrowed from abroad? While Kurdish
villages and local agricultural production have been
decimated? While the only achievements of the two
oligarchies is to imitate Dubay! and build palaces
and supermarkets without explaining how, who decided
these and for whom they are building more and more
brick and mortar while destroying body and mind?
While women are killed every day and children die
daily from sickness and accidents?
The two dominant Kurdish parties of Barzani and
Talabani families, control economy, land, media,
money, peshmarga militias, political organisations
and internal and external relations. They consider
themselves the sole legitimate owners of land and
thus what exists on land including people is theirs
and they only need to divide it on the basis of
bipartisan agreement. Thousands of acres of land and
properties have been illegally and illegitimately
appropriated by family and obedient party members.
Although the issue of land and fair and rational
distribution and use of land and property is at the
heart of the vital interests of all Kurdish
population and its generations to come, they have
never bothered even to ask their servile useless
so-called parliament to pass a law to regulate and
control the sensitive issue of land ownership and
use and planning requirements.
As soon as he returned from Iran after the uprising
of people in 1991, Masud Barzani occupied the
popular summer resort of Sarirash and then the town
of Salah-al-Din for himself ad his sons as if he
inherited the land from his great grand father.
Talabani did the same occupying Qalachwalan, and
then Dukan summer resort and God knows how many
other properties as if he inherited them from his
great grand grandmother. Then they extended their
tentacles of land and property ownership in a way
that even the most despotic and lawless Medieval
feudal lords have not dared to do.
Hundreds of ghost companies are made with millions
of dollars of capital which are owned by relatives
and party loyalists. All the jobs and positions go
to family members and party loyalists without any
consideration of qualification, competence, skills,
knowledge, fairness, equal opportunity, integrity
and moral values. No one, even a cleaner, can be
employed unless the employment is supported by one
of the two parties, This has opened the door to
opportunism, immorality and the destruction of
national, cultural and social bonds that were
bringing the Kurds together while preventing tens of
thousands of qualified and skilled Kurds in the
Diaspora to return to Kurdistan to contribute their
modern ideas and skills to the building of their
nation . That is why even a sacred symbol such as
Halabja monument, was no more sacred to thousands of
young people who made it the object of their wrath
and frustration in March 2006.
The main reason behind this terrible state of
affairs is the insistence of the two party
apparatuses to cling to power in an illegitimate way
at whatever costs and their fateful refusal to learn
anything at all from the fate of Saddam and his
family empire. In fact they have found in the
absence of Saddam a golden opportunity to fill in
his shoes and replicate his system in Kurdistan. but
in a very incompetent primitive way. Everything that
the Kurds hated in Saddam and the Baath regime, they
reproduce, practise and adopt, including nepotism,
Baath penal code, insulting women of anfal and
destruction of Kurdish villages, without any feeling
of shame and embarrassment or any fear of long-term
consequences.
The Kurdish society is different from Arab, Turk,
Iranian and other Islamic societies. Kurdish society
is diverse politically and culturally. Kurds are
open-minded and quickly respond to positive change
and modern ideas and practices. The Kurdish leaders,
if they were real leaders, should have considered
themselves lucky and proud that hundreds of the
writers and intellectuals of their country are eager
to be participants in the political debate and
reconstruction and nation-building process and are
offering hundreds of good ideas, plans and critical
thoughts to bring about positive changes. But there
is not even one single avenue whatsoever, apart from
the avenue of party totalitarianism, that power
responds or is responsible to people, listens to
them, consults them and gives them opportunities to
participate in decision making not about big issues
of destiny but even about the most basic and local
issues such as provision of a service, building a
library or youth centre or improving a local road.
Any human being with the most basic common sense
knows what Kurdistan needed 16 years ago and still
needs are two basic things:
1. Supporting Kurdish agricultural sector to
flourish again by increasing local food production
to a self-sufficient level. Even in Europe and
within European Union as a whole, offering subsidies
for food production and encouraging farmers to stay
in countryside and produce food, despite sometimes
excesses of mountain food and milk which is
destroyed, is a sacred national policy to ensure
food security, prevent the collapse of national
economy and avoid food dependency on external
sources which would endanger national security.
Kurdish agriculture could thrive in just two years
if even one billion dollars from the stolen money
was spent on building new modern roads to create a
secure long-term transport infrastructure, pay
farmers and employ their children to stay in the
villages, subsidise and purchase their products with
higher than market price, create local markets, new
equipment, create farmers. And village
co-operatives, provide water, sanitation, health and
education services in the villages and open
community centres, youth training centres and
libraries in every village. It is criminal to employ
a farmer as a policeman and thus turn him into a
useless party servant (as parties only employ them
after they become party members) instead of keeping
him as a productive family unit economically,
socially and culturally.
2. Creating a strong credible and reliable financial
infrastructure up to international standards and
recognised by major international financial
institutions and investors. Kurdish officials
idiotically call for investment in Kurdistan while
there is not one single international bank in
Kurdistan. A small country with only two million
people and no substantial economic resources like
Latvia has become an international financial centre
and economic hub in just 16 years and its economy
grows by 8-10% annually with hundreds of
international companies investing in the country and
tens of international banks being built as landmark
buildings in the capital. But international
community respects and trusts Latvia because it has
become a genuine democracy with excellent
functioning democratic institutions , credible
independent institutions and internationally
recognised legal structures and standards. If
Kurdistan were allowed by tribal hegemonic primitive
parties to become a modern democracy, which our
people are absolutely ready for, then by now we
would have seen the buildings of all major banks and
financial institutions in Kurdistan and a strong
functioning economy growing year after year and
Kurdistan becoming the Mecca of investors as well s
tourists and democrats and liberals of the West. But
no one trusts you if you do not have a credible
legislative body and responsible and accountable
executive and you insist on corruption and lion’s
share in every venture without any credible legal
and financial structures. It is absolutely shameful
that there are no banks in Kurdistan that people can
trust to keep their monies, conduct financial
transactions and offer reliable financial services
vital for economic growth and industrial
development.
Time for serious thinking and responsible
initiatives
Kurdish leaders from both parties must think
rationally, act honourably and take initiative to
change themselves before they lose time for change.
I and I think no rational Kurd, have any objection
if Mr Masud Barzani and his family own the best
palace to live in, own land and property, and have
privileges and allowances. Or if Talabani uses a
dozen of palaces for his family’s use. But this must
be done legally and legitimately through a law
passed by parliament.
Some urgent steps
* The present budget allocated to Kurdistan must be
used for needs identified by people themselves.
Parliament should establish a special development
committee from members of parliament and experts
outside parliament to devise a five-year national
development plan and start a consultation process
with people. It is better to adopt a decentralised
approach and special budget is allocated to every
area (district) with local people given voice as to
how spend it and what projects they need.
* Kurdish leaders need take immediate steps to save
Kurdistan’s institutions and organisations from
party totalitarianism. It is a dishonourable crime
for parties to interfere in the universities and
educational institutions and vandalise their ethical
codes and scientific standards, I appeal to Prime
Minister Mr Nechirvan Barzani to issue an order
preventing absolutely any party interference in
Kurdistan universities and turn them into part-free
zones and centres of science and education no more.
No party political activity for at least five years
should be allowed within universities. Those
incompetent immoral people who have been employed on
party political basis should be sacked.
* Barzani and Talabani should take lead and give up
all their personal properties and return all their
money to the Kurdistan government. They should ask
parliament to pass a law allocating houses and
property to them and decide their annual salaries
and allowances. They should immediately dismantle
the Saddam-style political dynasties they are
building and ask parliament and government to give
equal opportunity to their sons and family members
to compete for political position and jobs on their
won merit.
* Next the two parties should give up their control
of media and gradually transfer their TVs, radios
and newspapers to private ownership. TV channels
should be immediately nationalised, with independent
experts running them after being regulated by
parliament.
* The most radical and effective steps that will
save the parties and our people will be to dissolve
the present ‘cabinet’ and form a new government
entirely from independent technocrats especially
from high calibre experts from Kurdish Diaspora.
This will prevent the re-emergence of destructive
hostilities and irrational rivalries between PUK and
KDP and make government an efficient institution
recognised and respected at home and
internationally.
* Parliament should pass an Equal Opportunity Law as
a matter of urgency and ensure legal protection for
equal employment on the basis of qualification,
merit and skills. All party-political appointments
in vital economic, scientific, and educational areas
need to be reviewed.
* Kurdistan parliament should also pass a law in
relation to land distribution and utilisation and
land and property ownership. All the land
distribution and property ownership made for party
political reasons should be nullified. Anyone who
has more than two properties and one plot of land
must account for it and people responsible for
corruption must be brought to account.
* Local elections are long overdue. Steps should be
taken for new local elections in all cities and
towns of Kurdistan. Political parties should not be
allowed their current illegitimate media and
financial and political organisational power to
interfere and influence the results of the local
elections.
These are just some ideas for the time being. One
feels so frustrated that any constructive proposal
looks like and act of self -ridicule. We have
‘officials’ who have no eyes to read, no ears to
hear and no mind to think. They are happy with their
absolute naked power based on theft and immorality.
They enjoy being Kurdistan’s Saddam’s without having
any fear of Saddam’s fate. I hope these cries from
our young people will awaken them before it is too
late.
-Questions and questions to those Kurdish officials
who do not have ears, By Peshraw Hamid
In every country human beings from those at the top
of power to those in the dark alleys of their
neighbourhoods, the rich and the poor, are all equal
in the eyes of law. If no one can stand and swim
above the law with the wings of power, then we can
be certain that every citizen can enjoy unlimited
freedom and we will have a conscious people that can
face up to the challenges of time without falling
into the trap of the games of fate, disasters of
nature and the excesses of power. This will create a
semi-paradise society in which individuals get even
bored of the range of freedoms they enjoy and
democracy ensures that no one misses participation
in its fruits and horizons.
But where do we stand from these achievements of
democracy which the Kurdish power claims with pride?
Have we ever, at any time of our lifetime, felt that
there is no one above the law? Who has among us
become overwhelmed with those ranges of freedoms
that the Kurdish power has given us?
When we did not know what democracy was, the Kurdish
parties came down from the mountains and offered it
to us with their bloodstained hands. We took a
breath of rest and a sigh of satisfaction that our
bodies survived the pains of breaking into pieces.
They always tell us that democracy and freedom are
the gifts of the uprising and the Kurdish parties
have offered them to us as their presents. Perhaps
those who are still lying in the jails of the two
parties or have been made disappear, just because
they were wearing a green or a yellow shirt, they
were just unlucky and they missed picking up a juicy
fruit of freedom from the body of the parties.
Who among us has not seen or heard how party
officials on our ugly streets have beaten up traffic
policemen {for making them aware of their driving
offences]? Who has not been scared to death by the
crazy speed of the vehicles of officials and then
has not sworn at them for endangering his life? Who
has among us failed to hear or read from the party
media and their hired journalists that the shooting
of demonstrators by police and security forces is an
act of wisdom by parties and power?
God, we talk about journalists. What sort of
journalist do we have? They are just feeble
creatures whose pens shake shamelessly out of fear
from wrathful officials, then they cover the white
body of some pages with blood and then put the pale
body of a newspaper in the auction house of their
media.
Is there any one among us who has not participated
at least in one demonstration to demand the most
basic services and rights only to be harassed,
threatened or beaten up by their police?
Is there anyone among us who is not aware of the
defects and failures of Kurdish parties? Who has
among us failed to read their treason? Their
treachery against our people and our land and even
against themselves? Who has not understood by now
how they sell their treason to us as patriotism and
national achievements? Who has among us not suffered
from their internal fighting? And now who has among
us not stood up hours and hours in queues and for
days and days just to get some fuel? Who has seen
standing in queue among us the son of any big fat
official, a medium-sized official or even a mediocre
and trivial official, waiting with us for fuel even
for one minute? Is there any one in this country who
has not read the files of treason of some big heroic
figures of Kurdish parties or has not heard about
them? Who has among us was present when the Jallads
(slaughterers) were tried to spit on them?
Who fails to know who the Saddams of our society
are? Which Kurdish power, which Kurdish party is
free from the culture of Saddamism?
Who has among us ever seen a Saddamist hand-cuffed?
When Iraq had one Saddam who met his deserved fate,
the Saddams of our country are still working hard to
kill our dream, yet there is no one to arrest them
and put them in jail, or to bring them to justice or
to bring them to account and stop them from hurting
and insulting us.
We, the ordinary people, we who have not been lucky
enough to become officials and powerful people
through their households and hereditary family
fortunes, we, those creatures who have not learnt to
become hypocrites and soul sellers, our words are
flowers and our criticisms aim at justice and
happiness and are free from hatred but they are full
of wrath against you. I mean you, the careless
heartless officials of this country who have ruined
our homeland and filled it with aggressive, evil
creatures, with thieves and corrupt people.
We have a hand to offer. What do you have to offer
us apart from insulting our will? We have a heart
full of love for our homeland. What do you have to
offer our homeland but burning and ruin as you have
always done? You have hearts full of hatred and
devilish instincts.
We have souls as high as the pride of our homeland.
But your souls are full of the breaths of Satan and
you are not prepared to exchange an hour of lust and
your table drink and dinner for all the cries and
tears of our homeland. Then how do you dare to call
us “anarchists”?
If any one who articulates a demand and makes a
stand against your useless and tasteless fights you
label as ‘anarchists’, then we are proud to be
anarchists deep to our bones and shout long live
anarchy!
Our dreams are all ordinary dreams. The freedom and
independence of the four parts of Kurdistan, is our
evergreen dream. But what is your dream apart from
monopolizing anything and everything. You dream that
we remain silent about your ugly games. Your dream
is to smash our hands wherever we raise it to
indicate your corruption. You dream that the
children of this country still play with these guns
which we celebrated as Nawroz flame during your
fratricide wars. We dream that all sparrows will sit
on our windows and are not afraid of our stones.
When we speak, criticise and give you opportunities
to purify yourselves of the crimes that have made
you rich, you accuse us of being enemies, spies,
traitors and ruiners of the stability and security
of this land. Who ahs criticised you and then ahs
not been threatened by one of your thugs or been
insulted? Do you expect that in our own cities we do
not know what official is corrupt, which one is
indulged in factionalism and who ahs been
revolutionary and who has been a hero of lust?
Yes, there are many revolutionary peshmargas and
noble officials among you. But there are also many
jashes (Saddam’s mercenaries) and irresponsible
officials. You have many useless empty answers to
our questions.
When you came down from the mountains to our cities,
your hearts were khaki like your clothes. Your hands
were clean as the blood of our martyrs. Your eyes
were full of hope as our eyes were full of
innocence. But when you forget the days of the
mountains and your eyes got red with greed, you lost
all beauty. I know all of you have not been like
this, there are some who still keep innocence in
their eyes and shed tears for those who have
forgotten their past and worn the dress of greed and
corruption., those who own shares in every business
(fuel, poultry, buildings), they own three and four
companies and have married two or three new women.
We have a country which generates so many questions
about its own existence and the actions of its human
beings and demonstrates such immense aspects of
injustice, yet under the shadow of your freedom and
democracy our stuffed throats dare not articulate
our complains to you. And we still have not received
answers to the questions which we risked our lives
to ask. Still the officials, their sons, their
relatives and families are greater than anything,
above law and the rule of law is the last and the
least used rule in this country.
Then what do you want me to call you?
How can I describe your history?
How don’t you die of shame when our people
commemorate their tragedies?
How don’t you die of shame when the old women of
anfal come to your doors to beg for bread?
By Peshraw Hamid
Translated by Dr Kamal Mirawdeli from Kurdish
independent website www.kurdisatnnet.org
[http://kurdstannet.or.info/2007/12-2/prsyargela.pdf
] published on 12-02-2007
kurdistanreferendum org
* The contents of this article reflect the author’s
personal opinions
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