Out with the Old, In with the Older: Zebari and the Iraqi Presidency

Jay Ramesh

Iraq’s political system is complicated, but Iraqi politics can be even more confusing than the political system itself. There’s a lot of context to unpack here so I’ll do my best to help you navigate the confusing quagmire of what’s going on with the Iraqi presidency.

In a rare W for Iraqi democracy, Iraq’s Supreme Court barred Hoshyar Zebari from running for the presidency after complaints of outstanding corruption charges led to his suspension from the presidential race. This is huge news because Zebari was a strong favorite to win and put the KDP in control of the presidency. After Zebari was suspended, the presidential vote, which is held via a democratic election throughout the country, was also suspended. Zebari's outstanding corruption charges include diverting $1.8 million of public funds to buy airplane tickets for his bodyguards.

While this news may not seem that important on the surface, there’s a lot of context to unpack here, so let’s start by going over a basic rundown of the presidency. There are two major executive positions in Iraq- the president and the prime minister. Though the prime minister is much more powerful than the president, the president holds the position of head of state: they ratify treaties and laws passed by the Council of Representatives (Iraq’s legislative branch of government).

Iraq has a power-sharing agreement intended to both keep peace and keep the country together, and through this agreement, the presidency is reserved for Kurdish parties. Now, there are two main Kurdish parties: the KDP (a big-tent Kurdish nationalist party) and the smaller KUP (a more left-leaning Kurdish nationalist party). The incumbent president, Barham Salih, is a member of the KUP and Hoshyar Zebari, the KDP candidate, was set to run against him. At least, before he was smacked with corruption charges.

A handful of individuals hold immense political power in Iraq and use their power to appoint candidates for office to represent their parties. Because of this trend, Iraq tends to cycle through familiar faces in its politics, with the same political figures moving from old positions to new ones instead of being defeated in election campaigns. 

Zebari is one of these people- he has been a dominant figure in Iraqi politics over the past 20 years, starting off as the Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2003-14 and serving as the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance from 2014-16. He was removed from office via a vote of no confidence due to corruption allegations, and those allegations have come back to seriously hurt the KDP’s chances of winning the presidency. Politically, Zebari is also very pro-west, which would have been a powerful check on the anti-west and anti-Iranian stance of the Arab Shia prime minister Mustafa al-Khadimi. 

Though the KDP claims to be the face of Kurdish nationalism, its leader, Masoud Barzani, has often prioritized loyalty and party power over Kurdish unity. Barzani likely chose Zebari, his uncle, as the party’s nominee for the presidency so that he could assert more personal control over the presidency. In the wake of Zebari’s downfall from the candidacy, Barzani appointed another loyalist, incumbent Kurdish Interior Minister Rebar Ahmed Khalid, to run for the presidency as the party’s representative. He was a member of the Parastin, the Kurdish security agency and de-facto secret police. They have been accused of silencing critics, journalists, and anyone disloyal to Barzani. 

It seems unlikely that Khalid will oust the moderate Salih in the presidential race, but the future of Iraq remains uncertain. If Salih is reelected, the KUP would hold onto power, harming the widely popular Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr’s hopes for a government of national unity, neither aligned to Iran nor the West. The appointment of Khalid as the KDP’s next candidate also confirms that Barzani will likely try to hold

onto power through old political loyalists, rather than through reform and change. As President Salih and Prime Minister Kadhimi often don’t see eye-to-eye, a successful Salih reelection could lead to deadlock, or perhaps increase the chances for a less-corrupt democracy in Iraq. Either way, it will take some time for the KDP to recover from the massive L it took in staking its presidency claim behind Zebari.