Kurdistan Regional Government
10/6/13 1:20 PM
Kurdistan Regional Government
Kurdistan Region can show Iraq the way forward I had a fantastic evening listening to the talented young musicians of the National Youth Orchestra of Iraq the other week. Anyone listening to a National Youth Orchestra can’t help but be impressed by the dedication of the musicians and wonder at the hours of practice needed to get the piece exactly right. I watch my elder daughter – a budding violinist – and marvel how she breaks down the music bar by bar and perfects each section before putting all the pieces together into a seamless whole and my younger daughter as she starts learning the flute. But the fact that we were listening to the National Youth Orchestra of Iraq struck me as a triumph of will, inspiration and imagination. And, wow, were they good. The conductor had clearly not asked where people came from or which sect they came from: if they were good enough they played, if they weren’t they didn’t. As I listened to the inter-played ‘conversation’ between the strings and the woodwind instruments in one of the symphonies my mind wandered to Iraqi politics. If the different sections of the orchestra represented different interest groups in Iraq how did the music gel? Were the instruments in harmony? Was the overall product discordant or in tune? Did the public appreciate the performance? I don’t want to stretch the analogy too far but you get the picture. If Iraqi politics is the orchestra and the Kurds are, say, the string section, did the music work? Is the balance right? In recent weeks, in particular, it seems here as if the music has been discordant. There is no mistaking the frustration, anger even, in the Kurdish http://www.krg.org/a/print.aspx?l=12&smap=010000&a=41710
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Kurdistan Regional Government
10/6/13 1:20 PM
system with the overall sound. From Erbil, Baghdad politics is looking fragmented; the strategic direction unclear. I have heard some Kurds question how seriously Baghdad takes the principles of federalism enshrined in the Constitution and whether Baghdad and Erbil share the same understanding of the balance between powers that are reserved in Baghdad, those that reside in the KR and those that are shared between the two. The answer can only be more dialogue and more practice. The orchestra needs the strings and the string section needs the orchestra. It is not an easy process. In the UK, London has had to grapple in recent years with the new Devolved Administrations in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland as centuries of practice had to be changed and re-worked. It is still a work in progress. The make up of Iraq means federalism has to work. The Constitution has to be the guiding principle. The rest of the region can learn from Iraq’s progress. The Arab state model established in the 50s, now unraveling in the Arab Spring, looked to western eyes to be overly centralized, too rigid and a poor protector of minority rights. Saddam’s Iraq was the very worst example of this. Iraqi Kurdistan has a lot that it can show to the rest of Iraq and other Arab states as a way forward. A functioning federal Iraq is a model that many other states emerging from authoritarian, centralized systems could look to with interest. Chris Bowers is British consul general in Erbil.
http://www.krg.org/a/print.aspx?l=12&smap=010000&a=41710
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