Hawlati’s interview with Kamal Mirawdeli on the results of Kurdistan region’s presidential elections
Kurdishaspect.com - Translated by Presidential Office of Dr Kamal Mirawdeli
Mirawdeli: Talabani was scurrying every corner to collect votes for Barzani but he failed
Hawlati newspaper, Sulaymaniyah 20 August 2009: The former candidate for Kurdisatn region presidency explains the details of the attempts of KDP intelligence agency Parastin for his character assassination and says that KDP’s dictatorship coup ended the process of democratic elections in Arbil and other areas controlled by the Barzani household. Mirawdeli who won presidential elections against Barzani in Sulaymaniya province and claims he was denied victory in Arbil and Duhok as a result of fraud and vote manipulation, indicates that [Iraqi President Jalal] Talabani used various methods to collect votes for Barzani. He also says: “how can I accept a president as legitimate when God, people, history and the world would not accept him as a legitimate president and furthermore he has usurped my own right.”
[Hawlati] You rejected the results of the voting and described them as fraudulent. Do you think there was massive vote rigging?
[Mirawdeli] Although there were some attempts and instances of fraud, in Sulaymaniyah and Gramiyan up to Koye and Sedekan the voting was normal. Even in Arbil the voting process was proceeding normally until around 16 hours although there were forgery cases to increase the votes of the incumbent president. But after 4.00 pm the fraud became out of control and systematic. A pre-planned coup against the free will of the people of Arbil was implemented. All the monitors, representatives of political parties and people of Arbil confirm this truth. The polling stations’ managers appointed by the commission were not impartial. They received directions from KDP rather than from the commission. Until 3.30 according to the reports of external monitors 40 percent of people were voting. After 4.00 pm the number of voters has suddenly and greatly increased through moving people in buses to various polling stations. These people were from [KDP] peshmarga forces and soldiers. They were being taken to many polling stations and were allowed to vote. As a result the ratio of voters in Arbil quickly rose to about 80 per cent. The fraud was wide-spread, ongoing and systematic. This is clear to everyone and the role of the commission in planning and implementing this plan is clear. They increased voting time unnecessarily by one hour to enable the implementation of this plan. They used a kind of ink which was easily washable. They printed one million extra ballot papers. They facilitated the use of over 200,000 111 forms for fraudulent voting. The KDP-affiliated mangers of voting stations co-operated with KDP officials to facilitate for the flood of KDP voters. The commission also colluded in turning Duhok province into an exclusive KDP election zone. While the KDP head of the commission acknowledged that there were over 700 complaints against voting irregularities and violations, he randomly dismissed them saying that they do not affect the declared results even before they were investigated. These all are proofs for the commission’s playing with the will of Kurdistani people and its criminal collaboration in the organization, implementation and covering up of the fraud coup of dictatorship against the democratic process in Arbil and Duhok.
[Hawlati] You won Sulaymaniyah province, do you think that you did well in Arbil and Duhok too but the fraud has changed the results?
I had got the same level of high votes in Arbil and to some extent in Duhok too. But KDP’s dictatorship coup aborted the process of democratic voting in Arbil and the areas under the control of Barzani household. I started my campaign at Halabja and then, because of the short time, most of my campaigning was in Garmiyan and Sulaymnaiyah. If the TV channels and the political power behind them knew any meaning of justice, equal opportunity and freedom of speech, they could have shown only five minutes from my campaigning and my progarmme every evening and then every one would have realized why people gave me their trust and support. I have over 40 hours of films of my popular oppositional campaigning but 4 minutes of which has not been shown anywhere. On the one hand, I am an intellectual, academic and familiar with the European culture and democratic system. On the other, I am a simple villager and tribal man and look at all the constituents of my people with a great love and respect and I understand their pains and problems. The people have been discontent and angry for a long time and awaiting a person with a mission to remove injustice and inequality and ensure the future of their children; a person who at the same time could be trusted that he would not work for power, money and personal, family and party interests. Kurdistan was waiting to hear the voice of a true and courageous opposition. There had been no one before me who directly goes to people and openly and systematically from a patriotic, humanistic and scientific viewpoint speaks fearlessly against the despotic dictatorial family system and its crimes of killing Kurds and looting and destroying Kurdistan and offers a programme of constitutional and legal alternatives. People are good, brave, self-sacrificing, kind-hearted and civilized but it is the leaders who have always deceived them, betrayed them, played and traded with their martyrs and sacrifices and turned their blood into dollars, villas and capital for themselves.
[Hawalti] Some people say you did not deserve all these votes, people voted for you because they hate Mas’ud Barzani?
[Mirawdeli] But there were three other candidates people could vote for. In all countries there is science and scientific objective methods and field surveys and polling and studies to test and explain people’s attitudes. In Kurdistan none of these exist. Ultimately people themselves have decided and decide whether I deserve their votes or not. I have asked for open televised debates with Barzani several times. This is an essential feature of presidential elections to allow people to decide which candidate has the right personality, knowledge, education, courage and competence to become their president. Unfortunately Barzani did not respect this right of people and did not accept televised face-to-face debates. Most of my votes came from all the intellectual and educated strata of Kurdish society. They have voted for me with their full trust and confidence in my competence for this post in every aspect. But actually there was a total national consensus for my support including all forces, classes and strata of Kurdish society from martyrs’ families, to young people, to educated people to tribes and villagers. A woman who is a primary school teacher in Kalar phoned me and said she had made up her mind early to vote for me but she was surprised when her father who is an illiterate man went to her and asked her to vote for Kamal Mirawdeli because he has got right certificates and had European experience and was the right man for the job. Another family phoned saying that when they went to vote their two children aged 6 and 8 said to them: “Don’t come back home if you don’t vote for Dr Kamal.” Two young girls aged 17 regretted that they were not eligible to vote but spent the whole period campaigning for me. There are hundreds of stories like this.
[Hawlati] But you are known as a poet and intellectual and this is not suitable to being a president?
[Mirawdeli] Politically, knowledge and power cannot be separated. Political power produces such kind of knowledge and such sort of writers that help it to reproduce itself. In a party society you cannot find the agenda of true knowledge that is why all the things are fraudulent and fake because the conditions of their possibility and existence depend on the interests of power and its system of salary serfdom. If the universities were truly universities and if the cultural institutions, the media and newspapers were truly independent, professional and knowledge-seeking, this question would not have been asked because publishing more than six newspapers and magazines in Kurdish abroad, setting up various Kurdish organizations, writing the first project of pan-Kurdish national pact, tireless efforts and campaigning in London for setting up the safe haven in south Kurdistan, succeeding in taking one million and 700,000 signatures of referendum to the UN, and writing more than 700 studies and articles in English on the Kurdish question, etc, etc, all this would have been known to Kurdish citizens here and many academic studies would have been done about them. On the other hand, my poetry is not separate from political attitude in terms of representing the interests of people against power such as the poems: Qandil, I love your snow, Don’t die thus Talabani, Qandil Road is Prohibited, My country is a slaughter house of women, Came back from the mountain the revolutionaries, etc
[Hawlati] Did you have any pre-agreement with the Lists of Change and the four parties?
[Mirawdeli] Absolutely not. We did not have eve negotiations about this. I have frankly said in several interviews that I do not want many thousands of people to vote for me because a political party leader or leadership tells them to do so. I want Kurdish citizen to be a conscious individual who votes according to his own free choice and conscience. I only presented and explained my ideas and programme to people while [Iraqi President] Mam [honorific] Jalal Talabani was scurrying every corner collecting votes for Mas’ud Barzani. Unfortunately, as you know I was under a strict embargo by the TV channels of the political parties including KNN and Wisha Company. This embargo is still on without explaining the reasons to me. Even as paid advertisements they did not let me deliver even one single message to my people. When three days before voting the leaders of Gorran decided to tell people: “We do not believe in presidency and we will not vote for it” only then I told them this would be a very bad thing, it would be an act of treason against the Change movement as well as against me and a direct support for Mas’ud Barzani. I asked them either to stay silent about the issue or to tell people to vote according to their conscience. Eventually they told people that they would not support any of the candidates and they could vote the way they chose. I thank them for this!
[Hawlati] A party newspaper describes you as mentally ill and psychologically unstable?
[Mirawdeli] The injustice of media embargo and the lack of access to any media and publicity facility did not only affect my ability to express my voice and deliver my messages, it also deprived me of any tool to defend myself against attacks of character assassination and defamation unleashed by Barzani’s media. My sole defence has been the level of consciousness and conscience of the readers to believe in the rotten KDP media or not. Therefore I appeal to you to publish this explanation as it is. This is important too for the exposition of the reality of the so-called democracy in Kurdistan too.
I asked Barzani for open televised debate several times in order to debate the political issues, our programme for future and a number of big problems and deep wounds that people had been expressing to me in my campaign tours. When Barzani turned down the debates I put down some of these issues and wounds in writing and presented them to him in an open letter published in Awene. He did not answer any of the 15 questions I asked him. The mentioning of 31 August [1996 when Barzani captured Arbil with the help of Saddam’s army and tanks] and Kurdish internal war in my letter to Barzani did not aim at defamation of Barzani or increasing my votes. It is the greatest demand of people that the treasons and crimes of the past should no longer be ignored and just solutions should be found for the victims. It is very easy for those who are in power or seek power or enjoy a piece of the cake of corruption or a pint from the drink of treason or those who are writers or officials receiving multiple salaries and are enjoying themselves in the comfortable arms of corruption to forget and ignore all the crimes of the past and concentrate on the continuity of their present privileges. But I have met tens of martyrs’ families who in one single family have between two martyrs to 21 martyrs of fratricide. They are ignored now and their children live in the most miserable conditions and poverty. There are tens of families who have not even been told about the fate of their men. There are hundreds of the displaced people of the internal war whose homes and properties have not been returned to them and have not been redressed. Therefore it is not possible to say that the wounds of the past have been healed, the tragedies have been forgotten and the pains have ended. These should be dealt with through legislation. Any family or person who has suffered aggression, injustice, injury and violations of their rights and dignity must be able to use law to sue the people responsible of their harm and receive justice. They must be compensated according to clear just legal procedures. Before my candidacy for the presidency I had talked about this issue in tens of articles and interviews. As the president of Kurdistan region and the first person responsible for the tragedy of 31 August 1996 and for the years of fratricide together with Jalal Talabani, it is the responsibility of Barzani and Talabani to have answered by now people’s questions and grievances and have solved this issue through a law passed by parliament.
When Masud Barzani registered a legal complaint against me with the High Independent Electoral Commission regarding the interview I had with the Lvin magazine [in which Mirawdeli was reported to have described 60 per cent of Masud Barzani’s struggle as national treason], I congratulated Barzani for this step because if we resort to law to solve our differences this would be a big step towards establishing the rule of law and civil society. But unfortunately Barzani withdrew his complaint and instead the media of KDP and its Parastin [intelligence] agency started an aggressive campaign of defamation and character assassination against me. From inside a castle of old, pale rusty glass walls they started throwing boulders at me but I did not reciprocate even with throwing a small stone. Neither did I resort to the wisdom of [the great Kurdish Sufi poet] Mahwi to respond to crazy stone-throwing with thunder. I only resort to law and the consciousness and conscience of people.
Then when Barzani suffered great defeats against me in the elections in Garmiyan [KRG-controlled Kurdish areas of Kirkuk] , Sulaymnaiya, Sharazur, Dukan, Jafayeti, Bitwen, Pishdar, Khoshnawati, Koya, Balkayeti and up to the capital city of Arbil, they were left with nothing but, like the practice of any other dictatorial power, to resort to the personalization of the campaign and using the strategy of character assassination. For this purpose they systematically used three personal discourses: 1. the discourse of treason: they used this just two days after registering my candidacy when Hewler newspaper in Arbil published an article accusing me of being a Turkish agent working with Iraqi Turkomans to destroy Kurdistan Regional Government. They used this line of accusation in three or four more articles and reports. 2. The moral discourse they used photos and newspaper articles to infringe upon my moral character and accuse me of improper behaviour. 3. Mental discourse: when the above two personal attacks failed they started accusing me of mental disorder and psychological instability. They used party media strategists, TV seminars and newspaper articles and even interpretations of my poems to promote this discourse. But all these had no effect apart from humiliating themselves.
[Hawlati] What do you say about the circulation and publication of some of your photos?
[Mirawdeli] I was very unhappy about this not because they show any improper conduct by me but because they included the photo and a clip of a girl working voluntarily for KNN owned by Wusha Company of Nawshirwan Mustafa]. I am very concerned about the dire situation of women in Kurdistan region and the great injustice and crimes committed against them by the political power and the social system it has established. To protect this sister I have not previously made explanations about the photos. Before that the Balga magazine has unashamedly and illegally published the photos of a number of women working voluntarily for KNN while working or sleeping. The story of my photos is this:
Two days before the voting day over 20,000 posters were circulated by the KDP Parastin [intelligence] agency and members in every city and town of Kurdistan region. The distributors were captured in two places and they were KDP officials. They claimed that they were photos of me in my flat in London while a girl was doing makeup for me and polishing my eyebrows. Simultaneously Parastin men had been publishing various rumors about me. A clip of the girl with me was also produced in thousands of CDs and circulated to homes and shops. The poster photo was also sent to thousands of mobile phones via Korek SMC messages. The video clip was also posted on Youtube and other sites. At last they were published in Hewler newspaper, which distributes 25000 copies free of charge, and then used by KDP writers as an example of moral misconduct as well as mental disorder. The truth about the photos is this. The clip is real and true. It represents an image of me while a girl is treating some make-up to my face. But the place is not Europe. It is KNN where the building of Wisha Company is built on a hill in Sulaymaniyah. I had an interview with KNN four days before the voting day and as it is a normal routine in any TV interview I was asked to go to a small room where a girl arranged my hair and cleaned my face a bit. This photo/clip was secretly taken and on the same day was taken to KDP’s Parastin. Then in a an intelligence-military style operation more than 20000 posters and thousands of CDs were produced in the same night and KDP and Parstin members were mobilized over the next two days to circulate them all over Kurdistan region and in the way I described above. After I received a lot of calls from relatives, friends and supporters especially from Arbil that the circulation of the posters and CDs had a negative impact on my reputation and support there I asked friends at KNN to investigate the matter. When they failed to do so I asked them to give me two minutes to explain the matter to people. The friends at KNN happily agreed to have a long interview with me but they were prevented by higher authorities at Wusha Company. Therefore I have not been able to give any explanation about the photos until now.
[Hawalti] Why have you not congratulated Mas’ud barzani?
[Mirawdeli] I pointed out my position vis-à-vis Barzani above. I wanted to explain any relevant issue to people via direct face-to-face debate, dialogue and exchange on the pages of newspaper or through legal procedures. Instead of this KDP resorted to these ugly and aggressive intelligence methods I explained above. How can I consider a president a legitimate one when he is not considered legitimate by God, people, history and the world and furthermore he has usurped my own right? I was able to get the trust of my people in just three months and I would have been able as their president to prove just in three years that my people have no less love, ability and will to establish a true democratic system and achieve rapid economic, social, cultural and technological progress than any European people.
Translated by Presidential Office of Dr Kamal Mirawdeli
Sulaymnaiya, Kurdistan Region,
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September 2, 2009
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