Harry Barnes MP on Purple Power in Iraq

This article appears in today’s Yorkshire Post

The genie is out of the bottle, so to speak. The successful Iraqi elections could provide the tipping point for long overdue reform, workers' and women's rights in Iraq and throughout the Middle East.

The concept of one party Arab states such as Syria setting up polling stations and carrying electoral adverts for Iraqi expats cannot be uninvented.

How and when the Iraqi example is followed is unclear. Social change may sometimes seem glacial but can suddenly shock when, as Marx put it, "all that is solid melts into air."

The Iraqi elections certainly took place in circumstances not of anyone's choosing and 50 people lost their lives. But the turnout exceeded expectations and was sizeable in Sunni areas, despite boycotts and intimidation.

As one who voted many times against the original invasion, I understand why some are sceptical about the origins and organisation of these elections.

Democratic norms took decades to develop in the west. In Britain, the labour movement participated in imperfect elections until full adult suffrage was established in 1928 but that didn't invalidate using the process.

And Arab democracy need not mimic the Westminster model but find its own means of overcoming tyrannical and feudal regimes and reconciling religion with equality and freedom, although democrats elsewhere should support the reformers.

Purple Power - the Iraqis' mass defiance of the anti-democratic "resistance" - gives some reason to hope that terrorism's days are numbered.

Marginalising the broader "resistance" and winning over elements of the dispossessed and fearsome Sunni minority will be made easier if three conditions prevail.

First, Iraqi sovereignty is fully regained with foreign troops staying or going on Iraqi terms only.

Secondly, federalism and Iraqi unity are protected in the formation of the new government and the framing of the new constitution.

And, thirdly, both are buttressed by the growth of a just and non-sectarian civil society including trade unions.

It is argued that the presence of foreign troops fuels the insurgency. There is some truth here but it is not the whole picture. Most Iraqi parties recognise that the premature withdrawal of these forces, without a sufficient Iraqi security capability, will benefit those who wish to reinstate Baathist rule or turn Iraq into a medieval theocracy.

France, Germany and Islamic countries could send troops to help protect the new Iraqi state.

A clear understanding that all such troops will go when requested is vital to undermine the notion that Iraq is just a military base and/or petrol pump.

Iraq was dominated for decades by a minority of the minority Sunni population. Those who gained power, privilege and wealth are loath to lose it. The new Iraq seems keen to develop an inclusive society.

This is why so much rides on winning Sunni participation in the new government and protecting Sunnis in the framing of the new constitution.

A key issue is the role of religion in the constitution. Those who say that Islam should not be the only source of wisdom should be heeded.

Stabilising Iraq's fledgling democracy is not merely a military matter but requires a new politics, after years of totalitarianism.

An Iraqi friend once told me that oil was a bane rather than a boon to Arab society because it allowed ruling elites to rely on terror and ignore civil society.

But we have seen an appreciable growth in Grassroots Iraq in the last year or so.

A key part of Iraq's new civil society is the free trade union movement, in which the biggest component is the Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU). It has put down deep roots within Iraq and has won support from major national and international trade union centres.

It has built 12 individual unions and attracted at least 200,000 members, no mean feat against a background of massive unemployment, dislocation and terrorist murder and intimidation.

The old enemies of free trade unions in Saddam's security apparatus have targeted the unions as part of a concerted attempt to liquidate the leadership of the emerging Iraqi labour movement.

Shamefully, anti-war leaders like George Galloway have abused the IFTU
over its support for the UN political process and ludicrously described its leaders as collaborators. Such sharp words here have been mirrored by foul deeds there, as we saw with the torture and murder of the IFTU leader, Hadi Saleh.

Trade unions in Iraq can help activate civil society and by uniting workers on class and economic grounds increase the power of non-sectarian issues.

They will also be at the forefront of ensuring that the new Iraq isn't fleeced by foreign investors and privatisers, even if a country that relies on a decrepit oil industry for 97% of its wealth must win private and foreign direct investment to rebuild its infrastructure whilst also ensuring that Iraqi people have a fair share of the country's wealth and decent welfare provision.

We can now respect the Iraqi voters, respect the organisations that sought to make the elections work and retrieve our own self-respect by uniting to pour in huge moral and material solidarity to Iraqi unions, not least via the TUC's appeal.

Solidarity shouldn't be about doing favours for Tony Blair or George Bush but supporting our natural allies in Iraq, who have suffered for so long.

Harry Barnes is a Joint President of Labour Friends of Iraq