Tuesday, June 21, 2005

Constitution fever!

Public conferences and sessions in Baghdad and other provinces seem to be endless nowadays; municipalities, NGOs and forums are all very excited about Iraq's top topic which is writing the Iraqi constitution and they obviously don't want to miss the chance to take part in the historic event.
Such activities play a good role in educating the population and activating the concept of public involvement in the state's decisive steps through organizing sending the people's suggestions and thoughts to the authorities and making sure they're being considered.

During the past week, we were able to count a good bunch of interesting activities:

An advisor of the state ministry for women's affairs announced that the ministry will be holding its 2nd annual conference that would be dedicated to the issue of women's role in writing the constitution as well as providing constitutional education to Iraqi women so that they would be aware of their rights and duties in a constitutional state.
The conference will be attended by 14 foreign judicial personalities and is sponsored by the UNICEF.

The general directorate of youth organized an educational workshop about the role of youths in writing the constitution; a member of the National Assembly attended the event and he voiced his hope to see the "youth and sport committee" in the National Assembly get its deserved foundations and to get more care from the Assembly.
A number of young media workers asked upon the Assembly to officially grant the media a better access to the details of the constitutional process.
At the end of the workshop, the participants suggested that the government should sign the "children rights convention" which is already signed by 181 countries.

Another workshop was organized by the "Iraqi Journalists and Writers Association" where the role of the media and writers in the constitutional process was discussed in depth and the participants expressed their interest in seeing new legislations that protect the rights of journalists and media workers under international laws and agreements. Also the role of the media in spreading constitutional education had its share of the discussions.

Iraqis in exile had their role in these activities; the "Babil writers and artists association" held a conference (as part of a series) about the constitution to ensure a broader and more active participation of the independent intellectuals in this major national project.
The participants discussed the importance of learning from other nations' expertise and successes and mistakes.

Mean while "Iraq's Women" NGO is organizing a series of workshops for Iraqi women; again about the constitution and the role of women.

The "Akad cultural society" held a conference to discuss the necessity of including clauses in the constitution that protect the rights of writers and artists as well as the cultural rights of minorities.

It's worth mentioning that since the fall of Saddam's regime in April 2003; more than a thousand new NGOs of different interests were created in Iraq.

Mohammed.

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