The principle of consensus and the relatively even distribution of government positions among Iraq’s different religious and ethnic groups was something that was first introduced by US diplomat Paul Bremer, the Administrator of the Coalition Provisional Authority of Iraq following the 2003 invasion. He formed a council to govern the country temporarily and selected its 25 members according to a quota system. Based on the estimated population of various different groups in Iraq, the Council included 13 Shiite Muslims, five Sunni Muslims, five Kurds, one Assyrian Christian and one Turkmen. Any decision that the council made needed to be based on consensus, Bremer said.
The Council was eventually replaced by an interim government, which was also formed using the quota principles and which also came to decisions based upon consensus between the country’s different ethnic and religious groups.
However, ever since he came to power the current Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, has been saying that rule by consensus should end and in fact, that it makes it almost impossible to get anything done in Iraq.
“The system of quotas that we’ve been using for the past eight years has proven its shortcomings,” Abbas al-Bayati, a Turkmen and a member of al-Maliki’s coalition, told NIQASH. “Giving out positions based on ethnicities or sects has made the Iraqi government very unproductive. This is because some components of the government are in the opposition and they’re not interested in reaching consensus. That’s just not acceptable,” he concluded.
And there are other reasons besides this recent success with passing the 2013 budget that might well encourage al-Maliki to carry on with this new majority-rule system.
Iraqi MPs are continuously boycotting parliamentary proceedings. For instance, the biggest opposition bloc, Iraqiya, have been boycotting parliament in solidarity with anti-government protestors recently; these are mainly Sunni Muslim protestors as is the Iraqiya bloc. Kurdish politicians are boycotting the government because of the budget decision. And Sadrist MPs, who are actually part of al-Maliki’s coalition, are boycotting the government because they don’t like the way al-Maliki runs things.
The name of the game is "do not blame me!".
The kurds and sunnies are pushed to a break away from Baghdad and perhaps Iraq. If they are forced to leave the central government and ask for some sort of independence then it is their own decision, not the bad guy al-Maliki. He, he, he
Its like everyone keeps saying, those people can't agree on anything. Their so concerned about not getting every nickel that's out there, to share it with the rest of their people. Saddam, might have been a tyrant, but he controlled the way things were done, and their money was worth something. Now, you have all these greedy politicians, and carpetbaggers, in there cleaning up on everything. it's like the civil war, that happened in the US. All the civilized peopled left their country, and the riff raff came in, and are raping the country of all its wealth. These companies are setting up shop, but they will not accept payment for goods or services with the Iraqi Dinar. Its dollars, euros, etc. anything BUT the Dinar. So HOW can this country come together, if their own money is worthless???? It can't. All of those power wielding people there, don't get paid in Dinar, so how can this country make it. The answer is, IT CAN't and IT WON'T, until there currency is circulated amongst the streets and the people. Until then, it's a country without any direction. Maliki, can't get it together, and now he wants to be a dictator of how things are going to go. The only way to get those people to understand anything is to wield a gun, when giving a directive. Saddam knew this, he knew his people better than anyone. Yes, he was a monster, but he controlled the wild animals, and the only thing that has been eliminated is the zookeeper (animal tamer) whatever. Now everything is amok, with NO guidance or direction. Ask any of those politicians, if they are paid in Iraqi Dinar?????? They will respond " Are you crazy" "I don't work for free" Until they get their currency objectives in order, this country will CONTINUE to be bled of all its wealth, and the ones driving the bus are filling their cache's with anything but Dinar.