Despite his objections to the constitution, Grand Ayatollah Sistani is helping his country inch toward democracy with U.S. assistance.
Published March 10, 2004
Ali al-Sistani is starting to look - for now, at least - more like Alexander Hamilton than Ayatollah Khomeini. As Iraq's most influential Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Sistani holds virtual veto power over an interim constitution and, more broadly, over the fate of Iraq's ongoing experiment in democracy. After threatening to reject the constitution because of its limits on the majority Shiites' claim to power, Sistani gave Shiite members of Iraq's governing council his blessing to ratify the document. Sistani later issued a ruling criticizing the document, but by allowing the signing ceremony to go forward with full Shiite participation, Sistani sent another sign that Sistani and his followers will accept a new Iraq based on democracy, not theocracy.
Of course, the interim constitution, and the cooperation that led to it, could collapse at any time. Iraq is still terribly dangerous and divided. Fewer Americans were killed and injured in recent weeks, but Iraqi casualties are escalating. Hundreds of Shiites were killed in attacks on religious shrines. Dozens of Kurds were killed in coordinated attacks on their political headquarters. And dozens of Iraqi police and other officials cooperating with U.S. authorities have been targeted for death. These attacks, believed to be the work of Baathist holdouts and foreign terrorists, are intended to destroy the seeds of Iraqi democracy before they can flower.
Even if the terrorist violence subsides, the longstanding divisions within Iraq will continue to complicate efforts to build a new government. The Shiites, beaten down for decades by Saddam Hussein and earlier Sunni-dominated regimes, are suspicious of any compromise that might dilute their power. The Kurds have enjoyed unprecedented autonomy since the first Gulf War and resist plans that would require them to disband their militias and political structures. And even those Sunnis who are not part of the violent resistance fear that a Shiite-dominated government would spur a cycle of retribution against them.
So far, Sistani's example has helped to prevent the interim Iraqi authority from splintering. Sistani made an early decision to tolerate the American occupiers as long as they seemed on track to stabilize the country. The escalating attacks against Shiite targets and political disputes with U.S. administrators have tested Sistani's resolve. But Sistani has proved to a pragmatist - and a clever negotiator. He blocked the original U.S. plan for a complicated series of caucuses to choose a new government, and he insisted on constitutional language that ensures Shiites' rights. In the end, though, Sistani did not push demands that might have destroyed agreement on the new constitution.
Iraqis had to make the hard compromises, but the new constitution also is a testament to the patience and guidance of U.S. administrator Paul Bremer and other American negotiators. Much has gone wrong in postwar Iraq, largely because the Bush administration miscalculated the political and military challenges that would remain after Hussein was toppled. In this case, however, the administration deserves great credit for a painstaking effort to build broad support for a document that can serve as a foundation for a democratic Iraq.
