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Election In Iraq Stirs Tribal Rivalries

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The New York Times

The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 25, 2009

RAMADI, Iraq - Here in barren Anbar province, the tribes that were once the main source of support for killing American soldiers are running in provincial elections that, in the best case, could fulfill American promises to create stability in Iraq by the ballot box.

Two weeks from the voting, in Anbar it appears that the ancient tribal way of doing business is on collision course with the new ideal of democracy. Anbar is where the U.S. military enlisted tribal leaders and former insurgents to create the Sunni Awakening, fostering a calm that rippled across Iraq.

Now the tribes are jockeying to gain or maintain power, and people here complain bitterly that the machinery of democracy is gilding corruption, internal rivalries, and an intense feudal instinct that regards elected office - unthinkable under Saddam Hussein - as a chance for a bigger cut of provincial resources and security forces.

"It's a mess," said Sheik Amer Abdul-Jabbar, an elderly and ailing tribal leader from Anbar province, respected among some as the wise "prince" of Anbar but derided by others as an opportunist eager to lend his tribal credentials to the highest bidder.

A Landmark Moment

Across Iraq, the provincial elections scheduled Jan. 31 are viewed as a landmark moment to reshape, and make fairer, local politics. Many Sunni Muslims boycotted the last provincial elections four years ago, and as a result are underrepresented in local councils in many parts of the country. These elections will fix that, the United States hopes, while its own military and political power in Iraq wanes.

In Anbar, the campaign looks refreshingly like elections everywhere. Party posters are up all across the province, at times on concrete blast walls, reminders of more violent days. There are more than 500 candidates divided into 37 political groups, a robust choice given the boycott of four years ago. Sheiks making earnest campaign promises proudly display photographs of themselves posing with other politicians. One tribal leader managed pictures with both President Bush and Barack Obama.

Anbar, poor and lawless even under Saddam, is different from many other parts of Iraq. It is overwhelmingly Sunni, so the fights are not ethnic or sectarian but between competing tribes. When the Americans began paying former insurgents and tribal leaders to help enforce security, they favored some tribes over others, in many cases displacing the old for upstarts.

That fostered a general peace layered over an angry tribal instability that many fear could turn deadly, in the elections or after.

"We are not suited for democracy," said Maj. Gen. Tariq al-Youssef, chief of the provincial police force, who worries that the tribes are seeking political power not to administer the security forces but to co-opt them as quasitribal militias.

'This Is Democracy'

Broadly, the Awakening is seeking to transform its credentials as peacemakers into political power, a force for the minority Sunnis against the dominance of the Shiite prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, and the Shiite parties. Here in Anbar, the new political forces are meant to challenge the Iraqi Islamic Party, which became the main Sunni party after the elections in 2005, but often is accused of corrupt and autocratic rule.

On one level, the elections are functioning as American designers had hoped: The lure of elective office is creating new political entities seeking legitimacy through attracting the largest number of voters.

"This is democracy," reveled Mamoon Sami Rashid, the governor, who is running for re-election despite numerous corruption allegations against him. "Each sheik wants to have his say. Previously, only the paramount sheik ruled."

On a recent afternoon here in Ramadi, Bangladeshi servants whisked around trays of mutton and rice for well-wishers at the opulent compound of Sheik Ahmed Abu Risha, who is not running for office but is fielding a slate of candidates. His party is casting for votes on promises to rebuild Anbar's war-battered economy and to create jobs.

Dig deeper, however, and the tensions become clear.

Before the U.S. invasion in 2003, the Abu Risha tribe had not been among the most powerful.

As the U.S. military built up the Awakening groups, his tribe has flourished under U.S. support and political largess. Abu Risha's brother, Abdul Sattar Buzaigh al-Rishawi, was the leader of the Awakening until he was killed in a suicide bombing, betrayed by his own bodyguard, in September 2007.

Today, the Abu Risha estate is ringed with Iraqi army and police checkpoints. Ahmed's new wealth, as the Awakening leader, is on display: stables of Arabian horses, a camel farm, caged fawns, a pink mansion and a fleet of armored SUVs. Abu Risha owns properties as well as trade and investment companies in the United Arab Emirates. He envisions a similar future for Anbar and is pushing for a natural gas project worth billions.

"I dream of Anbar becoming like Dubai," Abu Risha said. "We have all the prerequisites."

Not everyone shares his vision.

Nestled amid palm groves just across the river from the Abu Risha fief is the seat of the Abu Dhiab tribe. Its leader, Sheik Mohammed al-Hayis, is nicknamed "the whale" because of the lucrative contracts steered his way by the U.S. military, admits his brother, Sheik Hamid al-Hayis. A large photograph of Sheik Mohammed with President Bush adorns his opulent mansion, which is decked with marble stairs and giant crystal chandeliers.

Discord Among Tribes

Sheik Hamid, who counts himself among the early Awakening leaders, said that Sheik Ahmed Abu Risha had "dishonored" the legacy of his late brother Sattar by forming his own political party and making friendly overtures to the ruling Iraqi Islamic Party, which Sheik Hamid describes as the sworn enemy of the tribes.

As a result, Sheik Hamid and his brother have formed their own rival election slate called simply the Tribes of Iraq.

Among his backers is Sheik Jabbar al-Fahdawi, who accuses Abu Risha of sowing discord inside many tribes, including his own Abu Fahed, by extending patronage to certain members of the tribes and promoting them over others as the real leaders.

"Ahmed inherited the Awakening from Sattar and turned it into an enterprise for deals and contracts," said al-Fahdawi, 35, who owns a contracting company. "Anbar is splintered; the tribes are splintered."

So some in Anbar are turning quietly to other alternatives: Gen. Saadoun al-Jumaili, a former commander in the Iraqi air force who leads an elite police unit in Garma, said a reconstructed version of Saddam's ruling Baath Party was becoming more popular. Although it is officially banned, Jumaili said with some approval that it was operating in secret in Anbar and that it was making strides in regrouping.

The party reportedly held a large secret meeting for its members late last year in the town of Khaldiya.

"The most honorable party at the moment is the Baath," said Jumaili, adding that tribal leaders, even his relatives, have no place in electoral politics.

On the streets of Ramadi and Fallujah there is little enthusiasm for the elections and ample accusations against both the Iraqi Islamic Party and the Awakening tribal leaders of siphoning off much of the billions of dollars of American and Iraqi financing intended for reconstruction. Much of the reconstruction, indeed, seems cosmetic.

"One gang leaves and another one comes in," said Anas Ahmed, 22, a government employee in Ramadi.

The greatest risk is that dissatisfaction with the current order could leave room for a return of the insurgency.

In recent months there have been a number of assassination attempts against political and tribal figures in Anbar. A double truck bombing against police stations in Fallujah on Dec. 4 killed 17 people. On Dec. 26, militants broke out of a jail here, leaving 14 dead.

"I am pained because the situation is providing openings for al-Qaida to come back, and it is coming back slowly but surely," said Sheik Aifan al-Issawi, a native of Fallujah and one of the original Anbar Awakening leaders, who is running for office.

Perhaps worse, some in Anbar say they are so fed up with what democracy seems to be bringing that they would welcome back the insurgency.

"This is what we will get from elections," said Hassan Ramzi, 47, a carpenter, pointing to the filthy streets of Ramadi. "There must be a radical solution."

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