Political Landscape of KRG and Future of Government to be Formed

Iraq's Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has been going through an active and heated period both in domestic and foreign policy over the past 1-2 months. First of all, official visits and talks between the KRG and Turkey have increased along with efforts to improve relations between Turkey and Iraq's central government; it was stated that new steps would be taken in parallel with this for new fields of cooperation. While these steps, which aim to promote the energy cooperation and trading partnership between Turkey and the KRG, will help the two countries get closer to one another, it has come out that they will be conducted in parallel with relations between Turkey and Iraq's central government. The Syrian issue also still occupies an important place in foreign policy when it comes to the triangle of Turkey-KRG-Iraq. Especially the conflict between the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), led by Massoud Barzani, and the Democratic Union Party (PYD) in Syria, as well as the position of Iraq's central government and Turkey have been among the subjects most discussed. While national and international public opinions are focused on foreign policy, very significant political developments have taken place internally in the KRG. These developments might create important effects in foreign politics, as well possibly influencing the KRG's internal politics deeply.

At this point, the process of forming a new government and the developments in Sulaimaniya have come to the forefront in the KRG. Above all, the fact that the new government has not been formed in the past two months since general elections were held in the KRG on Sept. 21, 2013 has created a gap in the KRG's internal politics. Coming first in the elections, the KDP has started to work on the process of forming a new government and assigned Nechirvan Barzani, who also served as the prime minister of the previous term, to form the new government. After Barzani was assigned to form the new government, he talked to almost each group with representatives in the KRG Parliament. The KDP's announcement that the government to be established would be open to everyone reinforces the odds that a broad-based coalition government will be formed in the KRG. However, at this point, the KDP faces certain problems, which are listed as follows:

The KDP's position in parliament

Even though the KDP came first in the elections held on Sept. 21, it cannot form a new government alone. Winning 38 seats in the 111-seat KRG parliament as a result of the elections, the KDP still needs the support of other political parties in order to form a government. Even if the KDP strove to get the support of all quota seats (11) reserved for minorities and non-Muslim communities in the Kurdish northern Iraq, it cannot reach the majority to form a new government alone. Therefore, the KDP needs support from the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), Goran or Islamist parties.

Since it is likely that the opposition, which strongly opposes a possible KDP-PUK coalition, will negatively react in case the KDP forms a coalition government with the PUK -- which has obtained 18 seats in parliament in the elections -- the KDP is trying to get into contact with various opposition parties as well. This situation is prolonging the process of forming a new government.

The ambiguity within the PUK

As is known, it seems quite difficult for PUK leader Jalal Talabani to carry out his duties due to his ill health. Therefore, the struggle for leadership that started within the PUK long before the elections obliges the KDP to take the balances in the PUK into consideration during the process of forming a new government. It is also known that differing attitudes have been observed among the parliamentarians along with the struggle for leadership in PUK. Therefore, it would be wrong to suggest that clear results have been obtained from the talks between the KDP and the PUK. Thus, the ambiguity in talks between the two weakens the hand of the PUK in the process of forming a new government. The fact that Jalal Talabani's security guard was killed during this process has negatively affected both the balances within the PUK and also the internal politics of the KRG, and it has caused tension in the environment.

The state of the opposition

The Goran Movement, the Kurdistan Islamic Union and the Kurdistan Islamic Group, which have surfaced as opposition parties, stated that they would act in unison in the process of forming a new government and that no political party should make up the government alone. However, the KDP visiting each political party one by one instead of holding talks with all parties together has caused suspicion on whether there are different attitudes within the opposition on the issue or not.

The fact that Nechirvan Barzani was flexible on political parties' participation in the government during talks with the Kurdistan Islamic Union increases suspicions regarding how opposition parties may react in case they are offered, in one-to-one talks with Barzani, to individually form a coalition government with the KDP.

Although the dissidence among the political parties in the opposition strengthens the KDP's hand in forming a new government with the support of the PUK and another political party during the aforesaid process, it would prevent eliminating dissidences in internal politics of the KRG. Considering that the opposition against the government formed after 2009 has become even stronger since the 2013 elections, it creates a problem regarding which party/parties the KDP will decide to receive support from. Hence, the KDP indicated in the early stages of the process that a broad-based government would be preferred.

Developments in Sulaimaniya

Recently, Sulaimaniya has been going through a tense period in terms of both politics and security. Here, the tension and struggle between the PUK and the Goran movement still continues after the elections, as it did before and during the elections. The Goran movement, which won a significant victory against the PUK in Sulaimaniya, strives to also increase its influence in Sulaimaniya through local politics. The Goran movement's pressure on the PUK to change the governor of Sulaimaniya on account of the expiration of the term of office due to the fact that local elections were not held on Nov. 21, 2013 yielded a positive result, and the PUK and the Goran movement agreed to assign a political figure from the PUK approved by both parties as the governor of Sulaimaniya until the local elections. This situation gave an advantage to the Goran movement both in terms of political moves and credibility. Besides, the steps taken by the Goran movement to change the mayor of Sulaimaniya did not yield any results due to the intervention of the KRG Peshmerga Minister. But all these developments strengthened the hand of the Goran movement. Furthermore, the statements that there could be initiatives to make Sulaimaniya a separate autonomous province even before the government talks began reveals the Goran movement's confidence in itself at a time when coalition talks for the foundation of a new government are ongoing. However, it is possible to assert that, nonetheless, the Goran movement does not want to come into conflict with the PUK. Although tension between the PUK and the Goran movement rises from time to time, the Goran movement is skillfully keeping this rising tension under control.

Considering all these factors together, it appears that the KDP is having difficulty in forming the new government. The fact that opposition parties are not acting in unison with the KRG's internal politics and that each opposition party has its own, strong bit of leverage complicates things in the KDP in terms of forming a new government. Considering that each group should be convinced to work together and form a broad-based government during this period, it is required that the KDP be very careful so that it can keep the government going, even if it should be successful in forming the government in the first place. As in Iraq's central government, the political groups in Iraqi Kurdistan could disrupt the nascent government and put it out of commission if they are not satisfied with their share. In conclusion, even if the new government is formed, the internal politics of the KRG could face many obstacles in the upcoming marathon to establish the new system. These obstacles preventing the KRG from finishing the marathon would affect both the internal politics of the KRG and also its foreign politics.