The announcement came after a series of confusing developments that began with the U.S. administrator for Iraq, Paul Bremer, and U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi telling al-Yawar their choice was Adnan Pachachi.
But after the latter announced that he would not accept the position, Iraq’s Governing Council voted to name its current president — al-Yawar.
It was less than an hour later when Brahimi issued a statement naming al-Yawar as his choice, but noting that he first offered the job to Pachachi.
The Brahimi statement also included his choices the two deputy presidential positions. Those selections were Dr. Ibrahim Jaafari, a Shi’ite Muslim and Dr. Rowsch Shaways, a non-Arab Kurd.
[More: CNN, Washington Post]
I think that what they’re trying to do in Iraq is something similar to the system in Lebanon where the President is always Christian and the Prime minister is always Muslim.
In Iraq, we see now that the President is Sunni, the Prime minister is Shiaa and Vice presidents are Shiaa and Kurdish.
The idea is to create a balance of power in the country so that no single group fully controls the government.
It worked for Lebanon.
Still I don’t think it’s that necessary if democracy is applied and diverse political parties have a role in the running of the country without certain roles having to be cut out for certain groups.
