ANSD : Students join Iraq protests, defying government and parents

SAT 20 - 4 - 2024

Date: Oct 28, 2019
Source: The Daily Star

Students join Iraq protests, defying government and parents

Four MPs resign in response to mass protests

_{Agence France Presse}
DIWANIYAH, Iraq: Students and schoolchildren hit the streets of Baghdad and southern Iraq Monday to join escalating calls for the government to quit, defying the education minister, legal threats and even their parents.

"No school, no classes, until the regime collapses!" protestors shouted in Diwaniyah, 180 kilometres (120 miles) south of the capital.

The capital and the country's south have been rocked by a second wave of rallies over perceived government corruption, unemployment and poor services.

The resulting clashes have often turned deadly, with more than 70 killed since Thursday.

Monday, Diwaniyah's union of universities and schools announced a ten-day strike "until the regime falls," with thousands of students and even professors flooding the streets.

Several local syndicates, including lawyers and engineers, also joined the movement, with picket lines preventing government workers from reaching their offices.

They came out despite higher education minister's warning Sunday that academic life should "stay away" from protests, after around a dozen schools and universities in Baghdad had joined sweeping rallies.

A spokesperson for Prime Minister Adel Abdel Mahdi even threatened any further disruption to schools would be met with "severe punishment."

But young protesters still gathered Monday morning in the southern cities of Nasiriyah, Basra and Kut, where most local government offices were shuttered as workers had not showed up.

In Baghdad, demonstrators gathered on campuses and in Tahrir Square.

"Qusay al-Suhayl said not to come down into the streets. But we say: no nation, no class!" one student protester said in Tahrir.

"All we want is for the government to immediately submit its resignation. Either it resigns, or it gets ousted," he added.

A group of three students drove up close to the square, unloading kits and cans of Pepsi to treat those affected by tear gas.

"It's my first day at the protests. I told my mom I'm going to class, but I came here instead!" a girl told AFP.

Four MPs resign in response to mass protests
_{Agence France Presse}
BAGHDAD: Four Iraqi parliamentarians resigned Sunday in anger at the government's perceived failure to respond to mass protests, piling more pressure on embattled Prime Minister Adel Abdel Mahdi.

Rallies demanding an overhaul of the ruling regime have rocked Iraq this month, defying live rounds, tear gas and other violence that have left more than 200 dead.

Parliament's only two Communist lawmakers, Raed Fahmy and Haifa al-Amin, quit the body "in support of the peaceful, popular movement," they said in a statement.

"We are resigning because of the protests and the way they were repressed," Fahmy told AFP.

"In 27 days, parliament has done nothing: it could not hold the prime minister nor the interior minister accountable" for reported violations by security forces, he said.

Their statement called on the government to resign and for early elections under a new voting system.

Two other lawmakers, Taha al-Difai and Muzahem al-Tamimi, also resigned Sunday.

Both belong to the list of former premier Haider al-Abadi.

The 329-seat parliament has been in crisis since the protests began on October 1.

Multiple sessions - including one Saturday - have been cancelled after failing to reach quorum.

The assembly met once in mid-October to appoint two ministers, a cabinet change which appears to have fallen short of protesters' demands for wholesale change.

The Iraqi Communist Party had allied with firebrand cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in the 2018 elections to form Saeroon, which boasted the largest bloc in parliament.

Sadr, too, has called on the government to resign and for early elections supervised by the United Nations.

Saeroon announced Saturday an open-ended sit-in to show support for protests.

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