Monday, July 27, 2009

Kurdish scholars: The new parliament will be ‘more effective’

Two Kurdish researchers speak about their expectations about how election results are going to change the political situation in Kurdistan. Rebein Rasoul, who heads the Kurdish American Association in Erbil thinks the results “show that the Change slate made a great success, while the Reform and Services (Islamist-Leftist) had a setback as the latter was looking forward to more than 20 seats”. Rasoul also speculates that “the next four years will be tough for the three blocs. Any shortcomings in their performance could lead to further (electoral) setbacks”. Rasoul warned that “most of the pressure will be on the current PUK (Talabani’s Party), which will have to restructure the party to avoid its collapse”.

Another scholar, Serdar Qadir of the University of Sulaymaniyah, thinks “the new parliament will be more capable of fulfilling its duties as a legislative branch and a watchdog body now that there are three different blocs”.

The important point in my opinion is one which both Rasoul and Qadir seem to agree upon. Both think that future legislations will require real debates and discussions within the parliament, unlike in the past “where legislations were passed simply by the approval of the two major parties”.

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