Gorran – one step forward

17 Jan 2013 – Kurdistan Tribune – Several prominent members of the opposition Gorran movement are upset because they have not been asked to join the National Council set up by their leader Nawshirwan Mustafa.

The local media has been full of reports this week of the resignations of three senior members who have complained about this. Is this bad news for Gorran? No, because these senior politicians still have the old autocratic attitudes of the past, from when they belonged to the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK). Gorran should feel proud that these people are now opposing it and confident that it has taken a step in the right direction. The three former members (Kadir Ali, Salar Aziz and Osman Haji Mahmoud) told Awene newspaper that they were  “going home and having nothing to do with the movement” although one of them claimed that he wasn’t resigning because of the National Council and that ‘some members’ of Gorran had upset him.These three are business contractors and landlords who were making millions of dollars while they were inside PUK until just a few years ago, even though they have made no contribution to the ideas of the movement . This is good news for the whole movement, as old members make away for the new generation.