Role of Political Loyalties

Role of Political Loyalties

Iraq became a failed state in the years following Operation Iraqi Freedom (2003). Disagreements between the political parties was one of the reasons for the failure of the state after Operation Iraqi Freedom (2003). During the instance where members of parliament were supposed to elect a national parliament, the states three largest parties combined to form a coalition, the Iraqi Accordance Front (Gaub, 2017). The action indicated a new friendship among these parties that usually had diverse views. Consequently, United Iraqi Alliance that was led by Shi’ite and consisted of two Shi’ite political parties became more fractured. Such was as a result of the exit of prominent party members to start their own political parties before the elections. The fractures led to division of ideologies, which enhanced the opposition in the parliament.

Furthermore, the ineffective leadership of the transitional Prime Minister, Ibrahim al-Ja’fari was part of the problem in the failure. The Prime Minister had been widely criticized by the Sunni Arabs, Kurds, as well as the Shi’ite leaders because of the mismanagement of government funds and government ministries (Mansour, 2017). Additionally, the Prime Minister faced opposition because of his inability to oppose and mitigate insurgency, as well as his low capability to control Iraq’s security forces that were dominated by the country’s militia.

In addition, the contribution of the political loyalties to the failure of the state also existed in the form of clashes between the Sunni and Shi’ite leaders on a variety of issues (Al Jazeera English , 2018). The issues of conflict included the de-Ba’athification project, corruption scandals, and disagreement over the roles to be assigned to neighboring states in resolving the conflict, as well as the failure to determine a specific way of solving the rising religious fundamentalism (Al Jazeera English , 2018). The growing tension between the Shi’ite and Sunni Arabs was due to increased cases of revenge killings and suicide attacks. The Shi’ite militiamen were alleged to work with the security forces to commit these atrocities leading to further failures in the transitional state.

The contribution to the failure by the Kurdish leaders was made more by Kurdish leader, Jalal Talabani’s criticism towards al’Ja’fari with allegations of monopolization of power on a variety of instances (Mansour, 2017). He also accused the Prime Minister of marginalizing the presidency while favoring some of the factions. The Kurds were also criticized for their increasing demands over Kirkut. The Kurds had the claim that they had the historic right to the governorate. On the opposition, Arabs and Turkomans proposed that the oil-rich territory should be outside the region occupied by the Kurds (Mansour, 2017). Consequently, the Kurds had been in frequent conflicts with the central government, especially over their drilling rights. The increasing wrangles within the earlier transitional and the later central government reduced harmony within the government, which in turn fueled more divisions and conflicts, ultimately derailing the governance of the state.

Role of Religious Loyalties

            Insurgency caused by religious loyalties derailed to efforts by the Iraqis to pursue the progress of their nation. Insurgent attacks on the Iraqi and American forces, as well as the population centers, reduced the public morale towards the development of the state. Additionally, the insurgents led to the destruction of infrastructure across the affected regions, which in turn derailed the nation-building efforts (Mansour, 2017). Such damage on the infrastructure also lowered electricity output, while causing most of the equipment and buildings in deplorable conditions. However, it has been difficult for the government to gauge the perpetrators and strength of these attacks, especially given that they occur consequently with the reprisal ones between the Sunni and Shi’ite groups that might not be related to the attacks by the insurgent groups.

Many of these attacks were linked to Ba’athist groups that are pro-Hussein and the Sunni Islamist groups that have close ties with the Al-Qaeda (Gaub, 2017). There have also been allegations that there are Iranian-backed forces that have been operating across Iraq. The religious allies form groups that have the aim of destabilizing the prevailing government and forcing multinational forces out of the country. Furthermore, the Iranian and Sunni Islamist groups have also been linked to allegations that they want to destabilize the government to form an independent Islamic state within Iraq.

Role of Ethnic Loyalties

Ethnic loyalties have also played a role in destabilizing the nation while derailing the efforts of the citizens to engage in nation-building activities. The minority ethnic groups are usually discriminated against the rest of the society, especially in terms of their share of the national resources. The Sunni Arab community is the least in terms of the ethno-religious identity. The ethnic group thus, advocates the separation from the state (Gaub, 2017). Different from their counterparts, the Shia, Sunnis used to be supporters of a single and centralized government, instead of the federalization system. Such was a contradiction of a feature of Iraqis that they advocate segregation along ethnic lines. As a result, they are highly likely to face conflicts from their Shia Arab and Kurdish counterparts. Due to these ethnic divisions, the country is less mobilized leading to changes in the formation of a cohesive political platform. The minority groups also seek the help of outside parties for protection against the majority groups. For instance, Abu Mus’ab al-Zarqawi, who is affiliated to the Al-Qaeda, had declared to commit atrocities against the Shi’a (Gaub, 2017).

References

Al Jazeera English. (2018, February 9). Iraq after the Americans | Rewind. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxhilUOdFZI

Gaub, F. (2017). Meet Iraq’s Sunni Arabs: A strategic profile. European Union Institute for Security Studies (EUISS).

Mansour, R. (2017). Iraq After the Fall of ISIS: The Struggle for the State. Research Paper: Middle East and North Africa Programme.