Al-Mada, Iraq, June 2
A few hundred dollars is the cost of a parliamentary seat in Iraq. I’m obviously not talking about the leather itself, but rather about the right to be elected into the Iraqi legislature, as the recent vote so clearly demonstrated. Take for example Muhammad Ali Saleh al-Zayni, who holds a doctorate degree from Colorado State University and served as the vice president of a major American corporation. Despite spending most of his life outside of Iraq, Al-Zayni decided that he is the patriot that the Iraqi people need—and now he will preside over parliament’s first session next week. He achieved this by spending a few hundred dollars on pamphlets and propaganda materials and hired a local team to distribute them among the residents of a few small provinces on the outskirts of Baghdad. Al-Zayni promised them money, to develop their area and to fight corruption. With the 7,300 votes he managed to garner—equivalent to less than one ten-thousandth of the total Iraqi electorate—Al-Zayni entered into parliament. Similarly, some 230 other Iraqi businessmen bought their seats in the legislature. As history has taught us, joining the Iraqi parliament is a lucrative business. The several hundred dollars spent by these individuals will yield a worthwhile return as soon as they are sworn in, given that bribes in the millions of dollars are nothing but the cost of doing business in Iraq. In a recent televised interview, for example, a former parliamentarian admitted to receiving one million dollars in cash to settle a matter in one of the Iraq’s provinces. He did not even try to defend his actions, claiming that all members of parliament charge a “commission” for their services. This is the shameful and dismal reality we must face. How can we ever expect true freedom in our country when those claiming to represent us have turned our political institutions into a prize to be won by the highest bidder? –Udnan Hussein