Kurdish Opposition Say Supporters Targeted in Workplace

Critics of the Kurdish authorities are claiming that the Kurdistan Regional Government, KRG, has fired and disciplined hundreds of military and security service employees in recent months for allegedly backing the opposition.



A leading opposition group, Change, told IWPR that approximately 1,900 military and security service employees have been dismissed, transferred or suspended in Sulaimaniyah province, which is controlled by the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, PUK.



Senior regional government officials deny that employees have been formally dismissed, and a government committee created by Iraqi Kurdistan president Masoud Barzani is investigating the allegations.



But a KRG ministry of interior official told IWPR that some police chiefs have been transferred for siding with the opposition and said the force would not hire opposition sympathisers.



Critics maintained that the alleged reprimands were tantamount to political persecution, asserting that authorities began punishing employees they suspected were sympathetic to the opposition ahead of an historic parliamentary election in July.



Change won an unprecedented number of seats for an opposition alliance in the region, which has been dominated for decades by the PUK and the Kurdistan Democratic Party, KDP.



The opposition group, which evolved earlier this year from a reform faction of the PUK, claimed the alleged punishments of opposition sympathisers are part of a pattern of autocratic rule and corruption that has hindered democracy in the region.



Change was established by Nawshirwan Mustafa, who co-founded the PUK with Iraqi president Jalal Talabani in 1975. A prominent leader with the PUK’s Kurdish guerrilla movement, Mustafa’s populist, anti-corruption agenda has drawn the support of many peshmerga, or Kurdish fighters, who were previously loyal to the PUK and fought for the party during the region’s bloody civil war.



Critics have long maintained that nepotism runs deep in Kurdistan. They claimed that government and some private-sector jobs in Kurdistan were reserved for party-affiliated candidates and that the security forces are more loyal to the parties than the government – charges officials have denied.



“The authorities are treating officers [differently] based on their political affiliations,” said Kwestan Mohammed, the leader of Change list in parliament. “They consider [employees] slaves. They do not believe in freedom of expression and democracy.”



Zanko Nasr, a Change leader who is spearheading a campaign to defend the alleged victimised employees, told IWPR that 1,300 members of the military and security forces have been fired or suspended, including guards, soldiers, police, members of elite security squads and civil brigadiers. Another 450 have been transferred from their hometowns, and 150 were fired after they were moved, he said.



Major Mustafa Abdullah, a former fire department chief in Rizgary, a town in Sulaimaniyah province, says he has been transferred five times since late April. A veteran Peshmerga fighter and Change supporter, Abdullah said he and three other officers were demoted and transferred to police stations in other towns because they did not hold high school degrees, an issue that he said was never a problem in the past.



“Our manager told us [unofficially] that we have been transferred because of Change,” he said.



Abdullah said he had been given few tasks. Demoralised and exhausted by long commutes, he said he had spent nearly a quarter of his salary on transport and rarely saw his family.



“They were treating us harshly and wanted to humiliate us,” he said.



KRG cabinet spokesman Nuri Osman denied that any government employee had been formally dismissed for their party affiliations and said the cabinet had not received any complaints about politically-motivated reprimands.



“No government employee has been fired with an official letter,” he said. “If there is anyone who has been fired, let them come to the cabinet and we will afford him his rights.



“These are just murmurs from the Change list.”



In many cases, sacked employees said their supervisors verbally suspended them but did not issue letters of dismissal.



Jalal Karim, a senior interior ministry official, told IWPR that the ministry has transferred fewer than ten police station chiefs over concern about their loyalties.



Karim said some station chiefs who are believed to be sympathetic to the opposition refused to deploy officers on the streets during the election, when young Change supporters regularly blasted their car horns, chanted slogans out of car windows and slowed down traffic.



“We have removed those who became Change supporters from their positions and moved them to other places,” he said.



“They are government employees, not opposition workers. So we are giving these positions to people who are from our party.”



Karim also said the ministry “will not employ a policeman or officer who insults the government from the hill”, referring to Change’s compound in Sulaimaniyah.



Scores of unemployed men have been seen milling on grassy knolls in the compound, which overlooks the tranquil, mountainous city of Sulaimaniyah. The heavily forested site is home to Change’s headquarters and its influential television station, the Kurdish News Network, which broadcasts stories about allegedly dismissed employees frequently.



Other civil servants also claimed to have been punished because of their political affiliations, though in smaller numbers. Approximately 300 teachers and headmasters held a protest outside the education directorate in Sulaimaniyah earlier this month, demanding reinstatement for 50 of their colleagues whom they claimed had been demoted or fired for supporting the opposition.



Kamal Nuri, chief of the education directorate in Sulaimaniyah, said the layoffs and demotions were part of an annual reshuffle that impacted 69 employees this year. Only four teachers submitted formal complaints claiming they were fired for their political views, and the education ministry is investigating their cases, he said.



Mohammed, the head of Change in parliament, told IWPR that the list, which holds 25 of parliament’s 111 seats, will try to pass legislation in early October aimed at winning back their supporters’ jobs.



Change is also planning to sue senior Kurdish leaders on behalf of the employees, including several ministers and security and military chiefs.



“They have ordered to expel these employees who have supported the opposition or they have kept silent when these employees were fired,” said Saman Hama Ahmad, who is heading the legal team.



Adnan Osman, a Change member of parliament, said the opposition is planning more protests with the wives and children of sacked employees unless they are reinstated and paid their full salaries.



Wrya Hama Tahir is an IWPR-trained journalist in Sulaimaniyah.