It has been getting incresingly clear since Monday’s announcement of a three-day period for final consideration of a draft constitution that the Shiite–Kurdish majority intends to just go ahead and push their draft through, regardless of Sunni objections.
Via today’s Jerusalem Post
Asked how to break the impasse, [Humam] Hammoudi [chairman of the drafting committee] said “the Iraqi people will rule” and suggested that the elected parliament could debate the issues and take a decision.
He then goes on to say, in a very interesting phrase:
Those who are representing the brother Sunni Arabs are not elected. Therefore, who can say that they really represent the people on the street … therefore the Sunnis have to express their opinion.
Of course, he has a point here. The Sunnis on the committee are co-opted members, and don’t represent anyone in the strict electoral sense.
However, how likely is that these members are acting outside of what is acceptable to most of their community leaders—by which I mean those who would have headed an elected Sunni delegation to the assembly had Sunnis participated in large numbers?
Not very, I would imagine.
So, what Hamoudi is really saying is that the Iraqi MAJORITY (i.e. its Shiite and Kurdish communities) will approve the constitution over the objection of the Sunni minority.
