Minorities in the Kurdistan Region have had their political future shrouded in uncertainty since a landmark ruling by Iraq’s Federal Supreme Court in February labeled the 11 quota seats in the Kurdistan parliament reserved for ethnic and religious minorities as “unconstitutional”, therefore striking down their legitimacy and rendering chances of minorities to attain representation in the legislature almost impossible.
“The Independent High Electoral Commission [IHEC] is required to allocate five seats to the appellants, one seat in Duhok province, two seats in Erbil province, and two seats in Sulaimani province,” said a Tuesday decision by the elections branch of Iraq’s Supreme Judicial Council.
The decision was in response to a complaint filed by Yousif Yacoub Matti, head of the Bethnahrain Patriotic Union, a Christian party that along with other minority parties said they would boycott the upcoming Kurdistan parliamentary elections.
The five seats will be within the allocated 100 for the Kurdistan parliament, according to the decision. “The seats must be divided among the three provinces of the Kurdistan Region; Sulaimani two seats, Erbil two seats, and Duhok one seat.”
IHEC spokesperson Jumana al-Ghalai told Rudaw that Erbil and Sulaimani will each receive one seat for the Christian and Turkmen components, while Duhok’s seat will be given to the Armenians.
The Kurdistan Region’s ruling Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) in March decided to boycott the upcoming parliamentary elections scheduled for June 10, expressing concern about multiple factors – foremost of which was the minority quota being taken away by Baghdad.
Earlier in May, IHEC temporarily suspended preparations for the Kurdistan Region’s elections pending a ruling on a lawsuit filed by the Region’s Prime Minister Masrour Barzani against the division of the seats for the constituencies.
The lawsuit that led to the February ruling by Iraq’s Federal Supreme Court was filed by two politicians from the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and a Christian party in Sulaimani against the Kurdistan Region’s election law, passed in 1992 and last amended in 2013.
It claimed that several articles of the election law were unconstitutional, including Article 36 which stipulates that 11 of the legislature’s 111 seats are dedicated to minorities under a quota system. Per this law, Turkmens have five seats, Assyrians, Chaldeans, and Syriacs five, and Armenians have one.
Following the court ruling, a coalition of six Assyrian, Chaldean, and Syriac Christian parties blamed the Kurdistan Region’s ruling parties - the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the PUK - as responsible for the Iraqi federal court decision to strip minority quota seats as they exploited the quota for their own benefit.
The Christian parties blamed the KDP and PUK for failing to “protect and preserve” the 11 seats by refusing to restrict voting within the ethnic and religious components.
Lawmakers from the minority quota in the Kurdish and Iraqi parliaments are often criticized for not being the true faces of the populations they represent but rather agents of ruling parties.
Winning minority candidates with external party affiliations often receive tens of thousands of votes from districts in which the community has very minimal to no presence in, as big parties often mobilize scores of loyalists to tip these candidates over the line.
A former Christian MP in the Kurdistan parliament told Rudaw English in late February that the ruling had made it “impossible” for a Christian to secure a seat in parliament.
