Kurdistan Region: Instead of elections, government chooses silence

By the KIE: Kurdistan Tribune – 15.11.2012 – Kurdish Institute for Elections (KIE) declaration concerning the provincial council elections in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq .

As their constitutional and legal right under the law of provincial council elections, number 4, 2009, citizens of Kurdistan region have the right to choose their representatives for the provincial and district councils. Since the January 2005 elections, no other elections of provincial and district councils have been held. Although eight years have passed, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), which announces the date for elections, is silent instead of implementing this democratic process.

At the same time, however, 14 other provinces in Iraq held elections in January 2009 and they are going to hold more elections in April 20 2013.

An environment where elections are constantly delayed and cancelled makes people suspicious about the government’s intention to make this a ‘new normal’ in the region so as to avoid sharing its power and prevent administrative decentralization. This situation will mean a continuation of the strict centralization of power in the provinces and districts of the Kurdistan region, where every sort of power-sharing is ignored and a huge, unnecessary burden is put upon the shoulders of the capital and its offices.We, in the Kurdistan Institute of Elections (KIE), an independent NGO which only supports democratic values and international standards of human rights, ask the KRG to announce the due date for the next elections as soon as possible. The due date should be made public to the people through the media so as to no longer violate peoples’ civic and political rights.

Kurdish Institute for Elections, Sulaimanyah, Kurdistan Region, Iraq,  14/11/2012