Iraq’s Interim Government: Part 2: Who’s Who 

Iraq’s Interim Government is now in power. In fact, all the ministries had come under the authority of the new Iraqi Cabinet several days prior to the transfer of sovereignty on June 28.

In the first part of this Dossier in the last issue, we looked at the problems facing the Interim Government and the structure and timetable under which it will operate. This second part examines the Cabinet and a few other issues facing the new government.

The new Cabinet is not, as some critics seem to think, little more than a warmed-over Iraqi Governing Council. The IGC was composed in large part of leaders of factions and parties. Most of those leaders are not themselves in the new Cabinet. Some have seen this as a potential weak­ness: for example, since the heads of the two main Kurdish parties are not in the Cabinet, they will exercise their power by threatening to order their party members who are to step down. (To put it another way, the Cabinet ministers are beholden to party or faction leaders who are themselves outside the government.) That may prove to be a problem, especially if the Kurds and Shi‘ites continue to bicker.

Although most of the major political parties supporting the transition are represented in the new government (Ah­mad Chal­abi’s Iraqi National Congress being a very obvious exception), many of the new ministers are technocrats or experts in their ministerial fields; some served under the former regime. Another potential problem is that the former Coalition Provisional Authority made a number of appointments, including the head of the new state intelligence organization, giving them lengthy terms which will extend into the period of an elected constitutional government. By implication the present Interim Government will not be able to change those appointments, though it is quite likely that in some cases they will seek to do so.

The new government does include a balance of confessional and ethnic groups, but for the most part the ministers are technocrats: persons with academic and job experience qualifying them to run the ministries to which they have been appointed.

The new government, needless to say, faces more than the usual challenges because of the security situation, especially in Bagdhad. Several deputy ministers and others in fairly senior posts have already been attacked (and two members of the former Governing Council were killed while in those positions). Physical security for the new government is therefore of greater importance that would be the case in a more stable environment.

All of that being said, the government is by no means impotent. Early polling suggests that many Iraqis are rather more impressed with this govern­ment than they ever were with the former Governing Council.

The success or failure of the transition will depend in part on the government’s (and the Coali­tion’s) ability to defeat the insurgency, and in part on its ability to hold the diverse factions and social groups together. There is no shortage of countervail­ing pressures, but the Interim Government is not the meaningless body some of its critics seem to imagine.

The Interim Government

President: Sheikh Ghazi ‘Ajil al-Yawar. See the Profile in the June 14 issue. A Sunni.  

Deputy President: Dr. Rowsch Shaways. A member of Mas‘udBarzani’s Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and President of the Kurdish National Assembly in the autonomous region. He previously served as Prime Minister of the Kurdistan Regional Government in 1996-99. Born in 1947, he holds a doctorate in engineering from Germany.

Deputy President: Dr. Ibrahim Ja‘fari. A Shi ‘ite physician, born in Karbala’ in 1947 and trained at the University of Mosul. He joined the Da‘wa movement (later Party) in 1966 and served as its chief spokesman. He lived in Iran in the 1980s and in London since 1989, and served on the former Iraq Governing Council.

Prime Minister: ‘Iyad ‘Allawi. See the Profile in the June 14 issue. A Shi‘ite, head of the Iraqi National Accord.

Deputy Prime Minister: Dr. Barham Salih. Born in 1960, Barham Salih is a senior figure in Jalal Talabani’s Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK). He served as the PUK spokesman in London and later as the Kurdistan Regional Government’s representative in Washington. He holds a bachelor’s degree in engineering fromt he University of Cardiff and a doctorate in statistics and computer modeling from the University of Liverpool. As Deputy Prime Minister he will hold special responsibility for national security.

Foreign Minister: Hoshyar Zebari. Zebari remain the post he also held under the Governing Council. A senior member of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, he holds a political science degree from the University of Jordan, and a master’s degree in the sociology of development from Essex University. He was KDP representative in Europe and headed the KDP’s International Relations Office. He was born in Aqrah in 1953.

Minister of Finance: ‘Adil ‘Abd al-Mahdi. Born in Baghdad in 1942, ‘Abd al-Mahdi is a Shi‘ite and a prominent figure in the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI).

Minister of Defense: Hazim Sha‘lan al-Khuza‘i. The new Defense Minister is a sheikh of the Ghazal tribe with degrees in economics and management from Baghdad University. He managed banks in Iraq during the 1970s but went into exile in 1985 and managed a real estate firm in Britain. Born in 1947 in Diwaniyya, he had been serving as governor of Diwaniyya since the war.

Minister of the Interior: Falah Hasan al-Naqib. A leader of the exile group Iraqi National Movement, he is from Samarra’, the son of a Chief of Staff of the Iraqi Army in the 1960s. Now 48, he was trained as a civil engineer in the US and had been serving as Governor of Salah al-Din.

Minister of Oil: Thamir ‘Abbas Ghadban. Born in 1945 in Babil, Ghadban is a technocrat who has worked for the Oil Ministry since 1973. He has a bachelor’s degree in geology from University College, London, and a master’s degree in petroleum reservoir engineering from Imperial College, University of London. He has held many posts in the Oil Ministry, including its Chief Executive Officer, before being named Minister.

Minister of Agriculture: Sawsan ‘Ali Magid al-Sharifi. She was Deputy Minister for Agriculture in the fomrer Cabinet. She holds a bachelor’s degree from Baghdad University and master’s and doctoral degrees in animal breeding from Iowa State. Born in Baghdad in 1956, she has held many posts in Iraqi agriculture and is the editor of the Iraqi Journal of Agriculture.

Minister of Communications: Dr. Muhammad ‘Ali al-Hakim. Believed to be a member of the Hakim family of prominent Shi‘ite leaders, born in Najaf in 1952. A communications technology specialist, he holds degrees from al-Mustansiriyya, Birmingham, and the University of Southern California. He was a director for Nortel Networks and Cambridge Technology, and founded a US-based company called Infoclarus.

Minister of Culture: Mufid Muhammad Jawad al-Jaza’iri. A journalist and a Shi‘ite, Jaza’iri is a member of the Iraqi Communist Party. Born in al-Madhatiyya in 1939, he took a master’s degree in journalism in Prague, and broadcast for Czech radio’s Arabic service. In the 1980s he fought the regime from the Kurdish region.

Minister of Displacement and Migration: Pascale Isho Warda. A woman and an Assyrian Christian, she is president of the Assyrian Women’s Union in Baghdad and a founder of the Iraqi Society for Human Rights. She served as a representative of the Assyrian Democratic Movement (ADM), an Assyrian political party. Born in Duhuk in 1961, she holds a degree from a French university.

Minister of Education: Sami al-Mudhaffar. A biochemist with a doctorate from Virginia Tech, he was a prominent scientist in several Iraqi universities. Born in 1940 in Basra, he served as President of Baghdad University and had been Deputy Minister of Education in the previous Cabinet.

Minister of Electricity: Ayham al-Samarra’i. Trained as an electrical engineer in Baghdad and Chicago, Samarra’i headed an electrical contracting firm and has experience in power plant design. He is a member of the Iraqi Independent Democrats led by ‘Adnan Pachachi, and is close to Pachachi.  

Minister of Environment: Mishkat Moumin. A woman, she is a law professor at Baghdad University specializing in human rights and women’s rights.

Minister of Health: ‘Ala’ al-Din Alwan. Educated at Alexandria Medical College in Egypt and with graduate degrees from the UK, Alwan was Dean and professor at the Medical College of al-Mustansiriyya University. He was World Health Organization head of mission in Jordan and Oman and has held other senior WHO positions as well as positionsi in the Iraqi Health Ministry. He was born in Baghdad in 1949.

Minister of Higher Education: Dr. Tahir Khalaf Jabur al-Bakaa. Born in Dhi Qar in 1950 and until recently President of al-Mustansiriyya University, he is a prominent historian and formerly Chair of the Department of History at al-Mustansiriyya.

Minister of Housing and Construction: ‘Umar al-Faruq Salim al-Damluji. An engineer with degrees from Baghad University, he has been a Professor of Civil Engineering and head of the Civil Engineering Department at Baghdad University. He has been a Visiting Professor at British universities as well.

Minister for Human Rights: Dr. Bakhtiar Amin. Born in Kirkuk and holding a doctorate in political geography from the Sorbonne, he has also served as a human rights expert in Sweden and France. He is Kurdish.

Minister of Industry & Minerals: Dr. Hajim al-Hasani. Born in Kirkuk in 1954 and a graduate of Mosul University, he also studied at the University of Nebraska and took a doctorate from the University of Connecticut. He lectured at US universities, headed a trading company in Los Angeles and was spokesman for the Iraqi Islamic Party. He was Deputy Chairman of the Finance Committee of the former Governing Council.

Minister of Justice: Malik Dohan al-Hasan. An octogenarian lawyer, he was named Chairman of the Special Task Force on Compensation for Victims of the Previous Regime and also became President of the Iraqi Bar Association last year. His degrees are from French universities. Born in al-Hilla in 1920, he served in the Iraqi Parliament under the monarchy and as Minister of Culture and Information in 1967 before the Ba‘athist coup.

Minister of Labor & Social Affairs: Layla ‘Abd al-Latif. Another of the Cabinet’s women members.

Minister of Public Works: Nasreen Mustapha Berwari. Born in Baghdad in 1967, she served as Minister of Reconstruction and Development for the Kurdistan Region. She graduated in 1991 from Baghdad Unieversity and also studied at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, completing a Master’s in 1999. She had headed the UN Office in Kurdistan and was involved in resettlement efforts.

Minister of Planning: Dr. Mehdi al-Hafiz. A Shi‘ite and a member of the Iraqi Independent Democrats, Hafiz served as Iraqi Ambassador to the UN in Geneva in 1978-80 and later worked for the United Nations. He holds a doctorate in Economic Science from Prague.

Minister of Science & Technology: Dr. Rashad Mandan ‘Umar. He held the same post under the Governing Council. A civil engineer with a doctorate from the University of Londno, he served at the Oil Ministry as Director of the Committe for Oil Construction until 1999, when he went to Dubai and worked in airport cosntruction. He is a Turkmen, originally from Kirkuk.

Minister of State for Provinces: Judge Wa’il ‘Abd al-Latif. A Shi‘ite born in Basra in 1950, he served as a judge in several southern cities before being imprisoned by the Ba‘ath regime. Last year he was elected as Governor of Basra.

Minister of State for Women: Narmin ‘Uthman. Former Minister of Education for Sulaimaniyya and a former Minister of Social Affairs in the Kurdistan Region, she is said to have served not only as an educator but as a peshmerga (Kurdish fighter). She is a member of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.

Minister of State: Dr. Qasim Dawud. Born in Hilla in 1949 and a longtime resident of Nasiriyya, Dawud holds degrees from British universities and worked in the UAE, serving as General Secretary of the Iraqi Democratic Movement.

Minister of State: Dr. Mamu Farham ‘Uthman. A Ph.D. in English and German philosophy, born in 1951.

Minister of State: ‘Adnan al-Janabi. A London-trained economist, he also is shaykh of the 750,000 member Janabi tribe. He holds a master’s degree in petroleum technology and held several oil related posts in the Iraqi government and at OPEC.

Minister of Trade: Muhammad Mustafa al-Jiburi. Born in Mosul in 1949 and a former head of the State Oil Marketing Organization.

Minister of Transportation: Louay Hatim Sultan al-‘Erris. Former Vice Chairman of the Baghdad Provincial Council and Director General for Iraqi Airways, he is a former Boeing aircraft engineer.

Minister of Water Resources: ‘Abd al-Latif Jamal Rashid. A civil engineer with a doctorate from the UK, he is a specialist in irrigation and drainage. He was born in Suleimaniyya in 1944.

Minister of Youth and Sports: ‘Ali Fa’iq al-Ghabban. Born in Baghdad in 1955, he is a member of SCIRI who left Iraq in 1980.

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