BAGHDAD — A top Shiite lawmaker urged parliament Monday to restore quotas for Christians and other small religious communities on ruling provincial councils that voters will select in balloting by Jan. 31.
Parliament had dropped the quota system, in place in six of Iraq’s 18 provinces, citing a lack of census data on how many Christians, Yazidis and members of other religions were still in those areas.
But Christians, believed to comprise less than 3 percent of Iraq’s 26 million people, complained that the change would effectively exclude them from representation in a political system where most people vote along religious lines.
“We do not want to emigrate to the U.S. or Britain — we want to stay in Iraq and have our representatives in both the provincial councils and the legislature,” the Rev. Louis al-Shabi said at a rally of dozens of Christians at a Chaldean church in Baghdad.
Deputy parliamentary speaker Khalid al-Attiyah, a Shiite, said none of the political parties intended to deny Christians and others their rights and that the matter should be solved urgently.
“We hope that this issue is solved as soon as possible and an article is added in the law, giving a number of seats to the minorities,” al-Attiyah said. “It should be for psychological reasons.”
Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Christians have fled the country since the 2003 fall of Saddam Hussein, fearing attacks by both Sunni and Shiite religious extremists. Christian leaders say that ensuring them limited representation would help preserve the community and give it a stake in Iraq’s figure.
Faraj al-Haidari, the head of Iraq’s independent electoral commission, said the date for the vote will be announced within two weeks. The independent elections commission will start registering candidates and political blocs Oct. 15, he said.
In a sign of improvements, authorities this week tore down a concrete wall in the flashpoint neighborhood of Fadhil erected to separate Sunnis and Shiites.
