Examination of Witnesses (Questions 80-92)
4 NOVEMBER 2003
MR NICK
PELHAM AND
MR PETER
DAVID
Q80 Andrew Mackinlay: How are the
ministers, particularly domestic ministers, so-called, appointed?
Do they really have any power or initiative? Do they always do
it glove-in-hand with the Coalition Authority? Are there any ministers
who are behaving like ministers in the normal sense of the word?
Mr Pelham: Yes, but they are severely
constrained. Ministers have American advisers and the American
advisers control the purse strings. The Governing Council was
allowed to show that it did have some metal and efficacy when
it was able to say on the Turkish issue, for instance, the question
of the entry of Turkish troops into Iraq, that they publicly disagreed
with the CPA and the Pentagon over the entry of Turkish troops
into Iraq and so far Turkish troops have not arrived. Yes, they
do have a voice and the voice tends to be louder outside Iraq
than inside Iraq. They are far more visible on an international
or regional stage than they are inside Iraq. When I left two weeks
ago, of the nine rotating presidents of the Governing Council,
only one was in Iraq at the time. Enormous numbers of them are
outside the country.
Q81 Sir John Stanley: You painted,
I am sure, a very accurate but very depressing picture of the
Interim Governing Council and you suggested that it is almost
an absentee body as far as people in Iraq are concerned. Starting
from that very low base, may I put to you the question which I
put to the previous witnesses, which is: how do you believe the
coalition, in particular the British and American Governments,
should be proceeding from this Interim Governing Council, with
all its inadequacies and lack of visibility, to some form of broadly
representative government of Iraq which enjoys a genuinely popular
mandate which the coalition can leave behind as the effective
in-place government of Iraq?
Mr Pelham: In Iraq at the moment
members of the Governing Council may not in all cases be the visible
representatives of their respective communities, but there are
broad constituencies in Iraq who do have a clear vision about
where they want the country to go. You have a Shia body with a
very powerful clergy who have a view about the direction they
want Iraq to go. You have the Kurds who are not represented on
the Governing Council[4]
But you also have sizeable constituencies which are excluded from
the Governing Council. The Sunni players in the Governing Council,
for instance, are fairly marginal to their own communities and
one of the great problems which led to the insurgency, is that
the Sunni communities did have the upper hand before the war but
are now only marginally represented. We need to find some way
in which the various groups, communities, in Iraq are properly
represented. If the United States is not able to include them
and to bring them on board, then you are going to have increasing
dissociation between the United States and politics in Iraq. The
insurgency would spread.
Q82 Sir John Stanley: I understand
entirely about these constituent groups and I understand they
have a real degree of homogeneity. The question I am putting is:
how do you believe the coalition governments should be making
the progress from this wholly inadequate body we have now to some
form of inclusive representative government of the whole of Iraq
which enjoys the confidence and a mandate from the Iraqi people.
It seems to me to be an absolutely central key question. Obviously
it is one for governments, but any light you can shed on that
as to how the governments should get to that objective from where
they are now would be very helpful to the Committee.
Mr David: May I just answer that
one? When I was in Iraq recently with Nick, I did have the opportunity
to ask Paul Bremer this exact question. The Coalition Authority
does have an exact plan which is pretty clear in its own mind,
which is to convene a constitutional assembly on the margins of
the governing body, a larger group than the Governing Council,
but one which is broadly representative of all the groups in Iraq,
to draft a constitution and then hold a referendum on it. Then
they hope, by the end of next year, to have a general election
based on that constitution.
Q83 Sir John Stanley: Can you tell
us Mr Bremer's view as to how the members of the constituent assembly
will become members? By appointment by him, or by their own communities,
by elections, or what?
Mr David: At his behest, the Governing
Council has established a committee which is trying to create
a larger group which in the view of that committee of Iraqis is
representative of the country as a whole. There is a strong view
put forward by Ayatollah Sistani, who is one of the most influential
Shia clerics in Iraq, that the constitutional assembly itself
should be elected by direct elections. Mr Bremer argues that would
be a very slow and laborious process and that there is not yet
in existence an electoral roll on which such an election could
take place. The counter view is that there is in fact a proxy
for an electoral role in the form of the UN food for oil programme
lists which in fact are a pretty comprehensive list of every Iraqi
and where they live. It is argued by those who favour early elections
that could be a proxy for an electoral roll.
Q84 Sir John Stanley: Does that procedure
which you very helpfully outlined, a constituent assembly producing
some form of constitution, subject to an endorsement of that constitution,
which presumably is going to enshrine some form of electoral elective
process, command general support within the Iraqi communities,
that particular procedure you have outlined?
Mr David: My impression was that
there is an appetite for some form of democratic event, an election
or a referendum, which will solidify the idea that the Americans
do intend to hand over power to the legitimate Iraqi Government.
I believe that there is impatience for that and an appetite for
it amongst most Iraqis I have met.
Q85 Sir John Stanley: What sort of
timescale do you see for that process up to holding a referendum,
constituent assembly, devising a constitution, having a referendum?
What do you think is a realistic timetable for that?
Mr David: The Coalition Provisional
Authority seems to think it should be gone through by the end
of next year and I imagine that is simply because the Bush administration
would like to have something clear to put in front of its own
electorate by next November and they would want something pretty
much in train by then.
Q86 Mr Illsley: Is there any significance
in the targets chosen by the terrorists in Iraq—the Jordanian
Embassy, the UN, Ayatollah al-Hakim, the ICRC? Is it perceived
as being foreign terrorists coming into Iraq and targeting these
places or terrorists within the country?
Mr Pelham: You have to distinguish
between the headline grabbing events and the day to day attacks
which the American forces are facing. The Jordanian Embassy, the
assassination of Ayatollah al-Hakim, the attack on the UN, all
appear to have been aimed at trying to cut off allies for the
occupation forces. There was a time when it was touted that the
Jordanians might be going in to assist the coalition forces and
following the attack on the Jordanian Embassy talk of that ended.
Similarly with the attack on the UN: it has been very successful
at cutting off the UN involvement in Iraq. The attack on Muhammad
Baqir al-Hakim did a lot to question Shia support for the United
States and to question the degree to which the Shias are ready
to come on board with the Americans, at least publicly.
Q87 Mr Illsley: If you see that differentiation
between the headline grabbing attacks and the stuff seen almost
daily of one or two soldiers killed in attacks, how widespread
is the political violence? Is this a small group of extremists
or does it reflect a really widespread opposition to what is happening
in Iraq in terms of the provisional authority and the Americans'
involvement in trying to create an administration?
Mr Pelham: Certainly the headline
grabbing attacks do not appear to carry much support within Iraq.
Most Iraqis, certainly immediately after the war, wanted reconstruction
to work, they looked to the United States and Britain to fulfil
their promises on reconstruction. The impact it has is that it
spreads more and more doubt in the minds of Iraqis as to whether
the United States can deliver. To that extent it is undermining
the degree to which Iraqis are ready to come on board with the
United States. They feel that if the United States is not able
to deliver, then it is probably not worth joining its effort.
The attacks are sowing a greater sense of doubt about the ability
of the United States to fulfil its mission in Iraq.
Q88 Mr Illsley: Is there any indication
of how widespread that feeling is amongst ordinary Iraqis? Are
there whole sections of the country which are working quite normally
and isolated areas of attacks? Or is this resentment really widespread
in society?
Mr Pelham: The mistrust is certainly
increasing. There are areas of the country where support of the
attacks is greater. You have to differentiate between support
for resistance against American forces and support for the bombings
and suicide attacks. There tends to be fairly widespread condemnation
of the attack on the UN, for instance, the attack on police stations
and an increasing tendency to blame outsiders.
Q89 Mr Illsley: Is there any buildup
of organisations in competition with the Provisional Authority?
The name I have is Moqtada Sadr, a cleric who organised some sort
of social services and food distribution alongside the official
organisations. Are there any organisations or small groups growing
in competition to what is being organised by the Americans?
Mr Pelham: Until now, amongst
the Shia community, no. Moqtada Sadr is a young firebrand cleric
and he did make a call for a rival authority. He said he was going
to set up his own cabinet, dependent upon the support of the people.
He called for demonstrations and there were not really very large-scale
demonstrations, so he has largely let that idea lapse. Amongst
the Shias the prime concern is not to repeat the 1920 experience
when there was a Shia-led rebellion against the British in Iraq.
The result of that rebellion was that Britain brought in a Sunni
monarch and largely maintained the Ottoman military structure
which had been in the country before its own invasion. The Shias
do not want to see a repetition of their loss of power. At the
moment they feel that if America can deliver a representative
government which would deliver majority rule then the Shias are
going to do very well out of that. There is still a wait-and-see
attitude on the part of the Shias, which even Moqtada Sadr is
not likely to jeopardise. At the same time he is the most vocal
Shia opponent of the US invasion, although until now he seems
to have been calling primarily for civil disobedience and not
violent disobedience.
Q90 Mr Illsley: Is the Kurdish community
still supportive of the US role in Iraq?
Mr Pelham: Yes, because the infrastructure
which was put in place after 1991 and the establishment of a semi-autonomous
zone is still in place. There is going to be the question, if
you can restore order in Baghdad and decision making is established
in Baghdad by Iraqis, about the degree to which the north is going
to be ready to see decisions which are made by Iraqis as a whole
affecting the north. They have their own parliament, they have
their own ministers. At the same time they are dependent—even
when a safe haven was in place they were—on Baghdad for
continued trade. They also want a share of the oil wealth of Iraq
and they are in charge of the Ministry of Water Resources, so
they have a stake in seeing this project succeed. Nevertheless,
if you go to Kurdistan today, after 12 years of separation, it
feels a very, very different place. The old generation can speak
Arabic, but the younger generation have not been taught Arabic
in schools; nominally they have, but you feel you are in a different
country. It is going to take quite a long time and a huge amount
of effort for Iraq to feel a single country again. That has to
be an area which the constitutional assembly addresses, the degree
to which this area is allowed to retain its autonomy.
Q91 Ms Stuart: What influence, if
any, does the BBC World Service have on the forming of public
opinion? Does it reach the public at large? I am just wondering
what effect the foreign media, particularly the World Service,
would have on public opinion.
Mr Pelham: In Baghdad and Basra
the Arabic Service is available on FM as well as the English Language
Service. The Arabic Service has had quite a popular programme
for putting relatives in touch with family members, but there
is considerable competition. Its reach is nothing like as great
as that of the satellite television stations. Satellites have
sprouted all over the country and the satellite television networks,
Arabic television networks, have a far greater penetration. They
are a lot sexier to watch and to listen to.
Q92 Sir John Stanley: If by any chance,
when the coalition leaves Iraq, Saddam Hussein is still alive
and at liberty, do you think in those circumstances there could
be any possibility of him and possibly some of his henchmen being
able to stage a return of the Baath party regime in Iraq and overturn
what the coalition has left behind?
Mr David: I think that is very
unlikely. My impressions have always been from a relatively short
visit, but the major groups in Iraq seem utterly hostile to Saddam
Hussein and that includes all the Shia, all the Kurds and quite
a lot of Sunni as well. In conversations on the street one heard
a fear that Saddam might come back, but very seldom, and only
in a few geographical pockets would one hear an aspiration that
he should come back. The thing that frightens Iraqis is the possibility
that the old regime could resurrect itself, but I do not see how
that could possibly come about, given the dismantling of the Army
and the lack of popular support for the old regime. The regime
is by and large reviled by most Iraqis.
Chairman: At the very least that is encouraging.
Gentlemen, thank you very much.
4 Note by witness: In fact there are Kurds whose
Leaders are represented on the Governing Council but there are
also sizeable constituencies which are excluded from the Governing
Council. Back
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