Parliament Approves the Second Maliki Government

Similarly, the smaller Sunni-oriented parties and the minorities achieved only symbolic representation, much as expected. What remains is thus a cabinet with a core of State of Law plus Iraqiyya. The big irony is of course that this could have been achieved as a government of a political majority instead of a national unity or “partnership” government, but now these two parties will have to put up with some 20 ministers that are not really needed (and who probably would not have managed to start any revolution had they not been included). There are already signs that Maliki is trying to gradually liberate himself from some of the kingmakers behind his second premiership (Sadrists, Kurds), but to what extent he will go all the way and make Iraqiyya his principal coalition partner in terms of deciding policy is an open question. Rather than risking an open rupture with the Kurds, he might instead prefer to pursue the Chinese water-torture strategy that he has adopted so far: Procrastination and indecision on matters like oil and Kirkuk, but at the same time solidifying his own power base as gradually as possible. Everyone said he would not be able to do that twice, and today everyone voted for a government that could in fact enable him to do it.

Finally, a word on the non-ministries that are supposed to be part of the deal but were not part of today’s vote: the deputy presidents. These are being talked about a lot, but they belong to the same category as the non-existent council for strategic policies: They are subject to future legislation by the Iraqi parliament. A draft law for the deputy speakers say they may be given whatever powers the president chooses to delegate to them from his own, which is not much since he now holds only symbolic power himself. Tragically, the Iraqi press keep talking about Adel Abd al-Mahdi (ISCI) and Tareq al-Hashemi (Iraqiyya) “keeping their current positions as deputy presidents”, which could not have been further from the truth. The deputies in the presidential councils and the deputies to the ordinary president are like apples and oranges, or like comparing ministries with peerages. (Possibly indicative of this trend is the increasing tendency of minorities to make claims to these positions, including Turkmens and even Basrawis of African descent). For Iraqiyya in particular it could be a potential problem that their two most popular politicians in terms of numbers of personal votes, Allawi and Hashemi, have still not been given any influence in the next government, although Iraqiyya as a whole did better than expected as far as standard ministries are concerned. Today, all elaborate “power-sharing” proposals were pushed into the future and Iraq remains saddled with a majoritarian system of government no matter how much its politicians talk about consensus arrangements. This looks contradictive and potentially dangerous right now, but in the very long term the failure of the Iraqi politicians to adopt American-sponsored crazy-quilt proposals for elaborate power-sharing could in fact provide them with the key to a better – and not least smaller – government for their people.