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2 A Shi'ite storm in the
making By Babak Rahimi
Post-Ba'athist Iraqi politics are
undergoing a dramatic change, and the Sadrists and
the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council (SIIC), formerly
known as the Supreme Council for the Islamic
Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), are leading the way by
bringing a major shift in the balance of power.
With the gradual decomposition of Prime
Minister Nuri al-Maliki's national-unity
government, mainly dominated by Shi'ite and
Kurdish parties, Iraq is entering a new political
era. As splintered
political factions, such as
the Sadrists, seek to form a new coalition made up
of Sunni parties, formerly exiled Shi'ite groups
such as Da'wa and the SIIC face new challenges in
maintaining a dominant political bloc in Baghdad.
Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's call to
create a "reform and reconciliation project",
which would include Sunnis, is a radical departure
from his sectarian base, which was formed with the
United Iraqi Alliance (UIA) and under the
spiritual leadership of Grand Ayatollah Ali
al-Sistani in 2004.
In addition, Muqtada's
move is a direct challenge to his main Shi'ite
rival, the SIIC, which has posed the most serious
threat to his political prestige and leadership in
Iraq since 2003. For the most part, limited
political mobility in the UIA and the Maliki
government itself were the sources of frustration
for the Sadrists, and most of the blame was
directed at the SIIC for its political tactics to
tame the Sadrist movement in the government.
SIIC leader Abdul Aziz al-Hakim's May 13
call to change the name of the party, dropping the
word "revolution" (thawra), brings to light
a key move by Iraq's leading Shi'ite politician in
preparing for the post-coalition era. As the
leader of Iraq's largest party, backed by possibly
the largest militia in the Middle East (Badr
Organization), Hakim's new strategy includes a
renewed pledge of allegiance to Sistani and his
Najaf-based religious organization.
The
reason for this symbolic reaffirmation of the
party's political position is clear. Hakim aims to
distance his party from its exiled past when the
party was based in Iran from the early 1980s to
2003, and reconstruct a Shi'ite Iraqi identity by
aligning with the Najaf clerical authority. The
call was also an attempt to establish distance
from the Iranian shrine city of Qom, where Iran's
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has
considerable power over religious and political
institutions.
Both factions are taking new
positions in a shifting political landscape.
Because of the failure of the constitutional
drafting process, tensions over key political
issues, such as federalism and the distribution of
oil, are paving the way toward a major
Shi'ite-on-Shi'ite conflict.
The two
parties appear to expect some sort of a political
confrontation over the constitution after the
future collapse of the Maliki government. What
these new strategies also indicate is how the
weakening of the Iraqi government is forcing
Sadrists to expand their military prowess for
control over cities and regions that are at the
moment dominated by the Badr Organization. A major
clash between the two Shi'ite parties can be
expected, and only a viable political solution can
prevent a full outbreak of conflict.
Arch rivals The early history of
Sadrist-SIIC conflict dates to competition between
the Hakim and Sadr clan families over influence in
the Da'wa Party since its inception in 1959. When
ayatollah Baqir al-Sadr, an uncle of Muqtada,
emerged as the most prominent leader of the Da'wa
movement, ayatollah Muhammad Baqir al-Hakim, as an
active member of the party, was eclipsed by Baqir.
Energetic, contemplative and charismatic,
Baqir's impact as a political leader was so deep
that after his assassination in 1980 he continued
to inspire a cult-like following among Iraqi
Shi'ites. However, a major split in Shi'ite
politics occurred when Hakim formed the SCIRI
(al-Majlis al-A'la lil Thawra al-Islamiya fil
Iraq) in Tehran on November 17, 1982, with the
help of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The formation of SCIRI in Iran was
perceived by many Shi'ite Iraqis, including
Muqtada al-Sadr's father, ayatollah Sadeq al-Sadr,
who later formed the Sadrist movement in the
1990s, as an Iranian intervention in native
Shi'ite Islamic politics, which was believed to
want to remain a homegrown movement. Since its
inception, the SCIRI has been perceived as an
alien, foreign agent by most Sadrists.
With the failure of the Badr Brigade's
(Faylaq Badr) military venture against Saddam
Hussein's army during the Shi'ite uprising in
1991, the SCIRI's chance to win the popular
support of the Shi'ite population was reduced
considerably. The death of grand ayatollah Abd
al-Qasim al-Khoi, the country's most senior
cleric, in 1992 opened the way for the formation
of alternative native Shi'ite movements to
energize Shi'ite aspirations for freedom from
Saddam's tyrannical rule, and ayatollah Sadeq
al-Sadr emerged as a leading candidate.
Sadeq's power base was so deeply grounded
in the plebeian Shi'ite population, especially in
eastern Baghdad, that still four years after his
assassination in 1999 by Saddam's regime his
movement continued to expand. On entering Iraq
after more than 20 years of exile in Iran in 2003,
Hakim witnessed the rise of a major Shi'ite
political rival, a young cleric named Muqtada
al-Sadr, who would publicly question his bravery
and Iraqi credentials for not only failing to
stand up to Saddam, but also for being a foreign
agent backed by the Iranian government.
Violence has frequently erupted between
the Mahdi Army and the Badr Organization since
2004, in such cities as Baghdad, Basra and
Diwaniya, and all of these clashes have their
roots in this complicated historical setting. Yet
such tension also reflects how each of these two
parties aims to control the future of the country.
Domination of oil production in Basra and military
control of major southern Iraqi provinces and in
eastern Baghdad are the key problems in this
growing dilemma. There is also a major ideological
rift: the envisaged future of Iraq as a
nation-state by the two parties.
Although
Sadrists are staunch Shi'ites, they are fervidly
opposed to Hakim's August 2005 call for the
formation of a nine-province Shi'ite region, with
Basra as the major governmental center. As Iraqi
nationalists, Sadrists are highly suspicious of a
federalist model for Iraq and consider Hakim's
proposal one that would snatch away economic and
political power from supporters of Muqtada based
in Baghdad. Hakim, on the other hand, opposes
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