The Iraqis' idea of democracy may differ from that of (the moron) Bush

The Iraqis' idea of democracy may differ from that of Bush

22 April 2003

From the start to the end of the war in Iraq there has been an affecting simplicity, verging on naivety, about much of what President Bush has had to say. His remarks over the Easter weekend were no exception. The liberation of Iraq, he said, would make the world a more peaceful place. With Saddam Hussein no longer in power, the Iraqi people's lives would be much better. Finally, he offered: "Freedom is beautiful. And when people are free, they express their opinions as they could not do before."

All those opinions, ventured so confidently, are now about to be tested in ways of which Mr Bush and his administration may never even have dreamt. While the US administrator, the retired general Jay Garner, marked his arrival in Baghdad by promising to repair the war damage as a matter of priority, thousands of Iraqis were using their new freedom to voice their discontent. For several thousand in Baghdad – far more than have ever turned out to applaud US troops – that meant protesting against the US "occupation".

Many, many other Iraqis are channelling their new freedom into religious expression, and not at all the sort of religious expression that US evangelist Franklin Graham plans to take to Iraq very soon. For more than three days, hundreds of thousands of Shia pilgrims have been making their way on foot towards the holy city of Karbala in a profession of faith that was banned under the rule of Saddam Hussein. The pilgrimage culminates with services in Karbala today.

This may be just an outpouring of pent-up religious devotion, nothing more sinister than a celebration of freedom restored. It may, however, be something much more profound and longer lasting. In cities, towns and villages across Iraq, the power vacuum left when the Baath party rulers fled is being filled. And in many places, it is not US or British placemen, nor any nascent democrats, to whom the people are turning, but the clerics of Shia Islam. The trend may be only temporary. The Shia, as is evident from the assassinations in another holy city, Najaf, are split into many rival factions. The legacy of Saddam Hussein is one of division – divisions he encouraged to keep Islam at bay. And while 60 per cent of Iraqis are Shia, power has resided hitherto with the minority Sunni.

Unless General Garner and his office in Baghdad can bring water, power and a reasonable semblance of order to Iraq's cities very soon, authority may gravitate irreversibly towards those Iraqis who can command respect at a populist level. At present, this means the imams; above all, the Shia imams who declined to attend last week's US-convened talks on an interim government, thereby seizing for themselves an opposition role.

It was not meant to be like this. One favoured scenario for the war was that the Baathist regime would fall almost of its own accord, leaving a near-complete administration intact. The British advance into the south was envisaged as primarily humanitarian, with convoys and pipelines bringing food, medicine and clean water to the needy of Basra. The fighting changed all that, as did the reluctance of the local sheikh nominated by the British to assume the burden of power.

Nothing is settled yet, and it may be at least a year before an Iraqi government is in place. In the meantime, nothing can be ruled out – including the possibility that this imposed revolution brings forth a government that looks rather more like those of Iraq's neighbours than the regional beacon of democracy forecast by President Bush.

© 2003 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd