Iraqis protest power and food shortages

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Iraqis protest power and food shortages

By Suadad al-Salhy





BAGHDAD, Feb 3 , 2011 (Reuters) - Iraqi police opened fire on Thursday to disperse hundreds of angry residents protesting against shortages of power, water and other services near the southern city of Diwaniya, wounding three, officials said.

The crowd of about 1,000 tried to force its way into a local council building in the al-Hamza district south of the Diwaniya provincial capital, demanding improved food rations and more power and water.

Diwaniya is a poor, largely Shi'ite province that has suffered serious shortages. Protesters accused Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki of breaking promises to improve services.

"The protesters threw stones at police. Police opened fire at them, wounding three," said Raad al-Zaidi, an adviser to Diwaniya Governor Salem Hussein.
"There was no reason to open fire. It doesn't matter if they tried to raid the place or threw stones."

Protesters set tires ablaze, hurled stones and tried to storm the local police station, witnesses said.

Some of the demonstrators held bundles of tea and sugar, while others carried small oil lanterns, to demonstrate the lack of staples and power, witnesses said.

"We have to buy everything, water, electricity and food staples because of the acute lack of these materials and services," said protester Lazim al-Khazali, a taxi driver.

"We have had no water for three days and because sewage flooded the city streets as a result of heavy rain, I could not work for a few days."

Similar protests were held last June in the southern oil hub of Basra, where police opened fire to disperse several thousand protesters demanding the resignation of Electricity Minister Karim Waheed. Two protesters died.

Dozens also demonstrated over lack of services in Baghdad's Husseiniya district on Monday.

Maliki's new government has been in place for just over a month, following nine months of tense negotiations between political factions after an inconclusive election last March. Lack of electricity supply is one of Iraqis' chief complaints.

Nearly eight years after the U.S.-led invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein, the national grid supplies only a few hours of power per day, driving up costs for businesses and compounding summer heat, when temperatures reach above 50 degrees Celsius.

Iraq has big plans to install turbines and capture gas at oilfields to ramp up electricity production, and needs to spend $77 billion to improve the power sector by 2030, according to a master plan. (Editing by Jim Loney)






:: Article nr. 74590 sent on 04-feb-2011 06:29 ECT


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Link: www.trust.org/alertnet/news/iraqis-protest-power-and-food-shortages/ (http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/iraqis-protest-power-and-food-shortages/)

[Fulanito de Tal]

"We have to buy everything, water, electricity and food staples because of the acute lack of these materials and services," said protester Lazim al-Khazali, a taxi driver.

"We have had no water for three days and because sewage flooded the city streets as a result of heavy rain, I could not work for a few days."

Sounds like US imposed capitalism

[freepalestine]

Protesters demand jobs and basic service
One killed, four injured in Iraq protest

Al-Arabiya.




http://uruknet.info/pic.php?f=49iraq31_136241.jpg (http://uruknet.info/pic.php?f=49iraq31_136241.jpg)
February 4, 2011


DUBAI (Dina al-Shibeeb)

Police shot randomly at hundreds of protesters in al-Hamza district in Iraq’s southern province of al-Diwaniya on Friday, killing one person and injuring four.

The incident came after a statement released on Thursday by the Iraqi parliament condemning the use of violence against demonstrators in Egypt and urged for the respect of human rights.

The protesters who followed up with their demands from a previous demonstration on Thursday called for the removal of al-Hamza head official and for the Iraqi government to provide basic services.

In addition to demanding employment, the protesters carried lamps and small sacks of sugar to symbolize their demands for food and electricity. The ration card system includes only necessary items such as wheat, rice, flour, and the government is mulling to cut the ration food supplies into four items only.

The ration card system was adopted in Iraq after the 1990 U.N. Security Council Resolution No. 661 to impose economic sanctions on the country following its invasion of Kuwait.

In December 2010 the U.N. officially lifted the sanctions against Iraq. It is estimated that government funding for the ration card in 2010 reached around $2.9 billion.

One of the protesters, Mohammed Hassan, 31, told al-Sumaria News that the police has arrested some protesters, and added that demonstration will continue tomorrow until demands are met.

Other witnesses said that the protesters threw stones at the police, burned car tires, and blocked the district’s main road for more than two hours.

Meanwhile, a local official from al-Diwania province, Dakhil Sihyoud, told al-Sumaria News that the police fired shots in the air to disperse protesters blocking the main road which he called "international" for connecting the southern part of Iraq to the center of the country.

"The provincial government does not mind any peaceful protest that respects the law," Sihyoud said, adding "provincial government formed a council to meet with the protesters to hear their demands, sit down to negotiate and execute the plans together with the protesters."







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[freepalestine]

Iraqis step up protest in job and food crisis

Nizar Latif




February 5, 2011

BAGHDAD // Protesters who stormed government buildings and a police station in a small, poor southern Iraqi town on Thursday continued their demonstrations yesterday, despite a crackdown by security forces.

Angry residents in Hamza, in Diwaniya province, 180 kilometres south of Baghdad, took to the streets for a third day yesterday after protests over shortages of power, food and jobs, as well as political corruption, turned violent.

According to demonstrators, at least one was shot and killed and another four were injured on Thursday when security men opened fire after the crowd tried to storm a police station. Officials in Hamza confirmed four people had been wounded but denied any deaths. They said police had been forced to respond after protesters threw stones and petrol bombs at them.

"There will be a revolution of the hungry and the jobless in Iraq, just as there was in Egypt," said Abu Ali, who helped organise the demonstration.

"It was a march by the unemployed, by those who have lost hope and who see [the prime minister] Nouri al Maliki and the new government becoming another dictatorship," he said.

The main road between Hamza and Diwaniya city, the provincial capital, was blockaded on Friday, with protesters manning barricades of burning tyres stopping traffic.

Diwaniya has a majority Shiite population and is one of Iraq's poorest provinces but it is by no means unique in suffering from unemployment, shortage of electricity and prohibitively expensive prices of drinking water. Residents say little has changed for the better in the eight years since Saddam Hussein was overthrown. Some complain the situation is worse because government-provided food rations are being cut, leaving the poorest families unable to feed themselves properly. There is also growing disillusionment with politicians, both on the local council and in Baghdad, widely accused of enriching themselves while doing nothing for the masses.

"We see the politicians on television awarding themselves US$100 million [Dh367m] to buy armoured cars for their safety, yet we get nothing," said Rashid Abd Ali, an unemployed man who took part in the protests. "We protested today and we will keep protesting until the government listens and takes action," said Mr Ali, who has eight dependents.

Influential Islamic scholars used Friday prayers to convey a similar message, warning Iraq's politicians that, while elected, they should not consider themselves immune to the kind of popular demonstrations seen in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen and Jordan.

"All governments, even democracies, must study the main reasons that have led to this public anger against their regimes, which started in Tunisia," said Abdul Mahdi al Karbalai, a representative of Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani.

"A lot has changed in Iraq ... but there is no social justice," he said.

The revolt in Hamza reflected nationwide anger at service shortages and perceived government failures, said Karima al Jawari, an MP with the Iraqiyya bloc. She warned that unrest could rapidly spread nationwide and, with protests in the Husseineyah district of Baghdad, also over poor services, there were indications that the process has begun.

"Iraq is boiling and it could blow up at any moment," she said.

"There needs to be a rapid response to these issues, jobs need to be created and there must be fast improvements in public services, otherwise Iraq will see revolution.

"The people are sending their message to the prime minister, to Ayad Allawi and all of the politicians that we must pay immediate attention to their needs."

In Diwaniya, a local university professor, Nidal al Sarmad, who also took part in the protests, said anger towards the government was "swelling in the chests of Iraqis" and that a nationwide revolution was "close at hand".

"The people feel they have been deceived, they are frustrated," he said. "The change the Americans brought has brought us a new set of thieves, a new set of dictators, not justice and freedom."

Opponents of Nouri al Maliki, the prime minister, have accused him of destroying Iraq's fledgling democracy after taking over control of previously independent institutions, including the organisation charged with running national elections. He also retains personal control over the ministries of defence, interior and national security, as yet failing to appoint ministers to these positions.

Mr al Maliki yesterday pledged he would not run for a third term. He said he would seek to amend the constitution so that all prime ministers would be limited to two terms.








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[freepalestine]

Protests in Iraq alarm the government


The Common Ills




February 5, 2011

Protesters who stormed government buildings and a police station in a small, poor southern Iraqi town on Thursday continued their demonstrations yesterday, despite a crackdown by security forces.
Angry residents in Hamza, in Diwaniya province, 180 kilometres south of Baghdad, took to the streets for a third day yesterday after protests over shortages of power, food and jobs, as well as political corruption, turned violent.
According to demonstrators, at least one was shot and killed and another four were injured on Thursday when security men opened fire after the crowd tried to storm a police station. Officials in Hamza confirmed four people had been wounded but denied any deaths. They said police had been forced to respond after protesters threw stones and petrol bombs at them.

The above is from Nizar Latif's "Iraqis step up protest in job and food crisis (http://www.thenational.ae/news/worldwide/middle-east/iraqis-step-up-protest-in-job-and-food-crisis)" (The National) and you can refer to Thursday (http://thecommonills.blogspot.com/2011/02/iraq-snapshot_03.html) and Friday (http://thecommonills.blogspot.com/2011/02/iraq-snapshot_04.html)'s snapshots for more on the Diwaniya protests. Alsumaria TV reports (http://www.alsumaria.tv/en/Iraq-News/1-59945-.html), "Hundreds of Iraqis took to the streets of Baghdad on Friday in protest against unemployment, freedom restrictions and other demands. Demonstrators waving the photo of late Argentinean revolutionary leader Che Guevara said they had no one to represent them in Iraq. Iraqi demonstrators urged to change the policies in Iraq and accused Parliament of shortcoming." Al Rafidayn notes (http://www.alrafidayn.com/2009-05-26-22-07-53/29635-2011-02-04-21-54-27.html) that they marched on Muntanabi Street, activist, young people and intellectuals, demanding improved services. Salar Jaff and Raheem Salman (Los Angeles Times) add (http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-egypt-iraq-20110206,0,1553404.story) that MP Abbas Bayati declared today that the Parliament "will also enact a law that guarantees equilibrium between the salaries of officials and ordinary Iraqis. The current circumstances are pushing us to descrease expenses and salaries, and spend them on the low income classes." Pushing? The Parliament's not held sessions during the recent holiday and only sprung back into them this week. This week has seen a lot of words but not a lot of action. Words include the announcement that Nouri won't seek a third term. Why does it matter who he said it to?


Announced by who? The Los Angeles Times isn't clear. He said it to Sammy Ketz of AFP in an interview. Ketz reports (http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=34206) him stating he won't seek a third term, that 8 years is enough and that he supports a measure to the Constitution limiting prime ministers to two terms.

Well Jalal Talabani declared he wouldn't seek a second term as President of Iraq in an interview and then . . . took a second term. Point, if you're speaking to a single journalist, it really doesn't seem to matter what you say. Did Nouri announce his decision to the people? No, Iraqhurr.org is quite clear (http://www.iraqhurr.org/archive/news/20110205/1093/1093.html?id=2298764) that an advisor made an announcement and that Malliki made no "public statement" today.


In other words, a statement in an interview is the US political equivalent of "I have no plans to run for the presidency" uttered more than two years before a presidential election. That's Iraqi politicians in general. Nouri? This is the man who's never kept a promise and who is still denying the existence of secret prisons in Iraq. Deyaar Bamami (Iraqhurr.org) notes (http://www.iraqhurr.org/content/article/2298674.html) the Human Rights Watch report on the secret prisons and that they are run by forces Nouri commands.

Meanwhile Al Mada reports (http://www.almadapaper.net/news.php?action=view&id=34690) that there are rumors of a reshuffling on Nouri's Cabinet in the next few months. Nabil al-Haidari (Iraqhurr.org) reports (http://www.iraqhurr.org/content/article/2298745.html) that efforts are now underweigh to provide the ration card system with actual rations the way they once were (US pressure has repeatedly led to more and more items being dropped from the rations system) and Nouri and his cabinet promised Friday that provinces will not experience shortages of what is currently offered. (No more will they experience shortages, that's the promise. A Nouri promise so refer to earlier for what that actually means.)Al Mada reports (http://www.almadapaper.net/news.php?action=view&id=34684) that Parliament wants an investgiation into the police interaction with protestors in Diwaniya (they shot at them). Al Sabaah notes (http://www.alsabaah.com/ArticleShow.aspx?ID=2137) that the Wafaa Amer Council has issued a call for Baghdad to train the country's security forces on how to interact with protestors.

Regardless of how serious the words are, they indicate grave concern over the protests that have been taking place in Iraq especially when put in context with the other protests in the region.

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