Baghdad, Jan 14, (VOI) – Several leaders from the former Baath Party currently residing outside Iraq expressed their categorical rejection of the accountability and justice law, which the Iraqi parliament passed on Saturday, describing it as an instrument of vengeance.
Tayeh Abdul Kareem, a former Baathist leader, told Aswat al-Iraq- Voices of Iraq- (VOI) by phone that the passage of the new law is an attempt to reinstate the old debaathification law.
Abdul Kareem, a one-time minister of oil who assumed numerous leading positions in the dissolved Baath Party, said, “The law is legally and socially unacceptable because it threatens the interests of a large segment of Iraqi society, which once belonged to the Baath Party.”
“This law violates our right to democracy,” Abdul Kareem indicated, describing it and the debaathification law as two sides of the same coin.
Another former Baathist member, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told VOI that the newly passed law threatens national reconciliation efforts in the country, revealing contacts between Iraqi mediators and U.S. officials to cancel the law.
According to the member, who codenamed himself Abu Hassan, the law indicates a desire for revenge on Baathists.
“The situation was like a large ship carrying all segments of Iraqi society,” Abu Hassan said, in reference to the time of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s regime. “It is more or less like an anti-Nazi law that opens the door to vengeance,” Abu Hassan added.
On Saturday, the Iraqi parliament approved the accountability and justice draft law by an overwhelming majority amidst rejection from four blocs.
The Iraqi National List (INL), the National Dialogue Front (NDF), the Independent Arab Bloc, the National Dialogue Council and IAF independent members rejected the law and declined to vote, saying it is “hard to apply.”
The INL, headed by former Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, has 22 seats in the 275-member parliament; the Sunni NDF, led by Saleh al-Motlak, has 11 seats; while the Independent Arab Bloc has only three seats.
The law is an alternative to the debaathification law, enacted by former U.S. civil administrator Paul Bremer, who ruled Iraq after the fall of the former regime in April 2003.
The debaathification law expelled tens of thousands of former Baath Party members from government posts.
In November 2003, Bremer established the debaathification commission to root out senior Baathists from Iraqi ministries and hear appeals from Baathists who were in the lowest ranks of the party’s senior leadership.
The accountability and justice law is one of four contentious laws awaiting government approval and parliamentary debate.
The U.S. administration is pressing the Iraqi government for a speedy enactment of these laws, which it believes will boost the national reconciliation project launched by al-Maliki’s government in spring of 2006.
The new law will allow 30,000 of Baathists to return to the political scene and receive their retirement rights.
Since it was first announced by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki in June 2007, the draft law has been facing fierce opposition and several reservations, mostly by the Sadrists, or Iraqis loyal to Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr, who occupy 30 seats in the 275-member parliament.
Aswat Aliraq | Baathists: Accountability, justice law an instrument of vengeance