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Iraqi lawmakers argue for caution in shaping oil law
They say that draft law has many holes, and that foreign pressure only draws ire.
from the May 18, 2007 edition
Page 2 of 3
And the oil law, already a repository of Iraqi sensitivities to sectarian divisions and decades of foreign exploitation, is increasingly mired in a Washington-Baghdad tug of war over Iraq's political progress.
As Congress continues its search for a way to fund the Iraq war that is not simply a blank check, the idea of setting "benchmarks" for Iraqi political action is gaining support. President Bush has spoken approvingly of war-funding legislation that calls on Iraq to move on issues the US believes would address its sectarian divisions and boost reconciliation.
Those benchmarks include revision of the de-Baathification law that has barred members of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party from employment, constitutional reforms promised to the minority Sunni population, provincial elections, and the oil law.
Republicans and Democrats are piling on Iraq's lawmakers for not moving faster. Sen. Mitch McConnell (R) of Kentucky, in a recent CNN interview, called the Baghdad government "a huge disappointment" and added, "I don't know what their problem is."
But when it comes to the oil law, their "problems" are many, Iraqi lawmakers say.
In its current form the law is ambiguous, many say, leaves too many gaping holes to fill at some later date, and fails to clearly delineate the rights and responsibilities of the central government and those of regional governments.
Then there are the ideological and sectarian misgivings. Many Sunnis – who feel vulnerable as a minority and come from a tradition of strong central government – oppose the legislation as a doorway to Iraq's dismemberment. Sunnis generally want a new Iraq National Oil Co. to be a strong federal power.
Many Kurds, meanwhile, are furious that annexes to the law would, in their view, give jurisdiction over a vast majority of oil fields to a centralized authority, with only a pittance left to regional governments like that in the Kurdish north. Some nationalists and the oil workers' union in particular tar the law as a privatization of the Iraqi people's common wealth.
Ambassador Crocker, speaking with a group of Western journalists Thursday, said sorting out such defining issues among "all of Iraq's communities ... is in its own way as important as some of these national issues we've been focused on."
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