Massive Protest Wave in Iraq Challenges Sectarianism

http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/09/10/massive-protest-wave-iraq-challenges-sectarianism

Religious sect is a real force in Iraqi society, all the more since regional players have poured billions into hyper-sectarian militias and media outlets. At the same time, Iraqis have consistently fought against the imposition of a quota system for government positions, as well as the culture of animosity that political sectarianism brings. Iraqis identify politically and socially in many ways — geographically, generationally and ideologically. They organize for gender justice, public sector jobs, cultural flourishing, environmental protection and more. Faith is only one aspect of these identities, though one that the world seems obsessed with boxing Iraqis into.

“We want an end to this sectarian quota system,” Uday al-Zaidi, the brother of famed shoe-thrower and journalist Muntazar al-Zaidi, told me back in 2011. That was in the midst of one of Iraq’s earlier protest moments, when the al-Zaidi brothers played a prominent role in leading calls for Iraqi unity and independence from the United States and regional powers, most prominently the Iranian government. And that’s just one example.

The Federation of Oil Unions in Iraq prominently called out the sect in 2007 as “a distraction” from their fight for labor rights and a say in Iraq’s oil contracts. Five years later in 2012, I interviewed Hashmeya al-Saadawi, president of the Electrical Utility Workers Union in Iraq, when then, as now, many Iraqis only get a few hours of power every day. While describing the scandalous Iraqi budget surplus — which totaled in the tens of billions of dollars — she called the sectarian system “hated” and asserted it was at the heart of the government’s dysfunction.

Perhaps the most crucial example is from 2013, when yet another protest upsurge that began in al-Anbar province, spread north and gained support across Iraqi society. The demonstrations, which were tragically transformed and infiltrated by al-Qaeda-affiliated groups that became ISIS, began as a struggle against sectarianism. “No to sectarianism … exclusion, marginalization and the politicization of the judiciary,” read a banner from a January 2013 demonstration.