New cabinet reflects Iraq's political mix

Commentary: The interim government is not made up of neutral technocrats as originally envisaged but is dominated by returned exiles, writes Michael Jansen

After 10 months of infighting and inaction, Iraq's US-appointed Governing Council suddenly united and took a series of decisive steps.

Having named Mr Iyad Allawi, a secular Shia who heads the Iraqi National Accord, as Prime Minister on Friday, yesterday it appointed Sheikh Ghazi al-Yawer, a tribal leader and business magnate, to serve as President.

It also named Mr Ibrahim Jaafari, head of the Shia Islamist Dawa party, and Mr Rowsch Shways, the speaker of the Kurdish parliament, to fill the two vice-presidential posts.

Mr Allawi promptly named a 31-member cabinet. Finally, the council dissolved itself, surprising everyone on the Iraqi scene. For many months the majority of its members have pressed the US chief administrator, Mr Paul Bremer, to extend the council's life beyond the June 30th date for the handover to the Iraqi transitional government.

The cabinet, which reflects the ethnic and religious composition of the Governing Council, represents its political parties and is dominated by returned exiles, is not the neutral government of technocrats which the UN envoy, Mr Lakhdar Brahimi, was meant to choose.

The Kurds constitute the faction most displeased with the composition of the government because they did not get one of the three top posts. Eight members are holdovers from the previous cabinet, cobbled together last September.

Among them are the Foreign Minister, Mr Hoshyr Zebari, a senior Kurdish politician who has won the respect of Arab and world leaders; the Minister of Health, Mr Alaadin Alwan, who previously served as minister of higher education; Mr Mehdi al-Hafidh, the Minister of Planning; and Mr Abdul Latif Rashad, the Minister of Irrigation.

The new Minister of Oil, Mr Thamir Ghadhban, was the ministry's director for many years and is regarded as a clean, efficient technocrat.

With the exception of the Kurds and one or two of the Islamist Shias, most ministers have no constituencies, and their parties have had neither the time nor the inclination to work at the grassroots level to build popular support.

Because they have no wide support base, some of the new ministers may feel that the route to parliament is to cultivate voters by implementing popular policies. This will be difficult for them to accomplish because, ultimately, military power and government funding will, for the moment, remain in the hands of the US.

The most urgent and important task the new government must address is security. Unless Iraqis regain a considerable measure of personal safety and order is reimposed, it will be impossible to rebuild or conduct an election.

Mr Allawi, a dissident Baathist, should, one source said, "reassure the military and mid-ranking Baathists" that they will not be shunned, reducing support for the resistance.

As a secular Shia with good relations with the powerful Shia religious establishment, Mr Allawi is expected to defend pluralism while accepting Islam as the state religion.

Mr Allawi is said to have close ties with the CIA, and this should give him a key role in security. After the dissolution of the occupation regime on June 30th, the Pentagon could cede dominance and the CIA and State Department are meant to play a larger role in Iraq.

Nevertheless, Mr Allawi will have to work closely with the US military which, after the transfer of limited sovereignty on June 30th, will remain in command of the Iraqi army, civil defence force and police, according to him.