Baghdad, Iraq – Members of Iraq’s National Assembly on Thursday approved a partial Cabinet in which top posts set aside for Sunni Arabs remained unfilled, falling short of the national unity government all sides say they have been seeking in nearly three months of talks since national elections.
Lawmakers rose in an ovation after endorsing Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari’s Cabinet list by a show of hands.
The endorsement marked the transfer of political power from Saddam Hussein’s long-dominant Sunni Arab minority to a coalition of majority Shiite Arabs and ethnic Kurds.
“Today signals a remarkable turn in Iraq’s political history,” al-Jaafari said at a news conference after receiving the embraces of fellow members of Iraq’s new leadership. He called the creation of Iraq’s first democratically elected government since the 1950s a “truly democratic exercise.”
The list approved Thursday left more than one-fifth of the new Cabinet’s 37 positions empty – two deputy prime minister spots and the ministries of defense, oil, electricity, industry and human rights.
Shiites and Kurds dominated the ministerial posts that were filled, and Sunni Arabs were named to four lower-ranking ministries, including culture, as was one representative of Iraq’s Christian minority.
Al-Jaafari, a Shiite from the religious Dawa party, will hold the Defense Ministry portfolio until a permanent minister is selected.
Another Shiite, Ahmad Chalabi, was named one of four deputy prime ministers.
In addition, Chalabi won assignment as interim oil minister, cementing the former Pentagon favorite’s political comeback despite a falling out with the United States and broad distrust among Iraqis.
Chalabi will hold the dual posts until Shiites resolve a dispute over which of them should have the oil post, according to politicians.
Three empty posts, including that of defense minister, have been set aside for Sunni Arabs as part of an effort to draw the disaffected minority away from the insurgency and into the political process.
But on Wednesday, Shiite leaders let their rank-and-file members veto nominees put forward by the Sunnis, accusing the candidates of having ties to Hussein’s Baath Party government, said Vice President Ghazi al-Yawer, the ranking Sunni Arab in the new government.
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WAR IN IRAQ
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