US revs up reversal of Iraq's Baath purge
Members of Saddam Hussein's party were ousted from Iraq's ministries and military in 2003. Now the US wants to reintegrate many disenfranchised former Baathists.
from the April 23, 2007 edition
Page 3 of 4
Waiting to be de-Baathified
Nawal Abed-Ali Hmoud has been waiting in vain for close to four years to be de-Baathified, the term for ex-Baath members who have gone through a reeducation program administered by the de-Baathification Commission. Until this occurs, she cannot regain her $300-a-month job as a typist at the state-owned Rashid Bank.
The commission has de-Baathified some 16,500 Iraqis. After Bremer first enacted the policy, about 140,000 former Baath members were kicked out of jobs. Just over 100,000 low-level Baathists were later returned to their jobs.
Ms. Hmoud was fired from her job in September 2003. She, like millions of her compatriots, had simply joined the Baath Party out of economic expediency. But, she says, she is losing hope that she will be de-Baathified soon. In the meantime, to make ends meet, she has set up a candy shop in an abandoned store in northern Baghdad where she had come with her family to flee sectarian violence in their own neighborhood.
"I am utterly convinced now that this commission is a sham and that the only Baathists that are returned to work are the ones that pay bribes or have someone to back them," she says.
The irony is that more than 20 years ago Ms. Hmoud and her sister helped a neighbor escape Hussein's henchmen. He was wanted for membership in Maliki's then banned Shiite political party.
The Baathist threat
In an interview at his Baghdad office, Mr. Lami says that while the work of his commission is now focused on the fate of just 21,500 former Baathists – out of 12 million Iraqis who ranged from sympathizers to active members – the body must continue to exist to make sure all government institutions are cleansed of the Baath Party's "totalitarian" ways.
"Baath, not Al-Qaeda, is Iraq's biggest enemy," he says.
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