VZCZCXRO4503
PP RUEHBC RUEHDE RUEHKUK RUEHMOS
DE RUEHIHL #0091/01 1431508
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
P 231508Z MAY 06
FM REO HILLAH
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 0633
RUEHGB/AMEMBASSY BAGHDAD PRIORITY 0619
INFO RUCNRAQ/IRAQ COLLECTIVE
RUEHIHL/REO HILLAH 0684

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 HILLAH 000091 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
BAGHDAD FOR NCT 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL:  5/23/2016 
TAGS: PGOV KISL KDEM IZ
SUBJECT: DECONSTRUCTING BABIL? SECULAR SHI'AS AND SUNNIS WARY OF PC, 
COALITION FORCES 
 
REF: A) HILLAH 79  B) HILLAH 80 C) HILLAH 82 
 
HILLAH 00000091  001.2 OF 002 
 
 
CLASSIFIED BY: Alfred Fonteneau, Regional Coordinator, REO 
Hillah, Department of State. 
REASON: 1.4 (b), (d) 
 
 
 
¶1. (U) This is a Babil PRT cable. 
 
¶2. (C) SUMMARY.  The unabated efforts of the Babil Provincial 
Council (PC) to usurp power from local municipalities and gain 
control of the provincial security forces continue to provoke a 
secular Shi'a and Sunni backlash against the SCIRI-controlled 
body (reftels A, B, and C).  While it is difficult to gauge the 
extent of this trend within the entire provincial community, 
secular Shi'a and Sunni opinion leaders, including reporters, 
NGO activists, police, and tribal leaders, continue to express 
their frustration with the PC.  These opinion leaders also view 
USG reconstruction efforts in Babil as ineffective and perceived 
U.S. political disengagement in the province as irresponsible. 
They also continue to ask the REO and the PRT to provide strong 
leadership over the PC, without which they maintain, 
reconstruction efforts will be in vain and this strategic region 
south of Baghdad will become increasingly unstable.  END SUMMARY. 
 
¶3. (SBU) Secular Shi'as in Babil represent a small portion of 
the entire Shi'a population.  They tend to be generally well 
educated and are usually either middle or upper class.  The 
Sunni population of Babil comprises of approximately twenty 
percent of the total population of the province and is 
concentrated mostly in northern Babil. 
 
-------------------- 
WHAT RECONSTRUCTION? 
-------------------- 
¶4. (C) Concerning the PC, reconstruction and the Provincial 
Reconstruction Team (PRT), a secular Shi'a journalist declared 
that the "people are not satisfied." "The PC and the government" 
he continued, "want to make projects fail or they authorize 
projects because they are in the direct [financial interest] of 
the PC."  Signs of reconstruction in the province are 
non-existent, the journalist claimed, and that the PRT should 
realize that the PC only recommends projects that correspond 
with their political vision and enhance members' financial 
positions, i.e. corruption.  Babil is lacking many basic 
necessities, including hospital equipment, cooking gas, fuel, 
electricity and most importantly, employment opportunities, 
despite the best efforts of the PRT to assist the provincial 
government, according to the journalist. 
 
¶5. (C) REO and PRT staff recently met with a delegation of 
secular Shi'a journalists during a "brown bag lunch" and 
discussed media development and local political issues.  The 
journalists explained that while technically they feel free to 
report on topics they deem important for public consumption, 
they remain unsure as to which subjects remain inappropriate to 
address.  Direct critiques of the PC and SCIRI policies, they 
further stated, are not issues they would often report, as such 
attacks could result in severe retaliation, including torture, 
kidnapping, assault on family members, and assassination.  This 
issue was such a concern that the participants even asked REO 
staff to assist them in securing firearm permits from the Babil 
police.  As to the accomplishments of the PC in the sphere of 
reconstruction, one journalist summed it up by declaring that, 
"They do not reconstruct, they deconstruct." 
 
------------------------------- 
THE PC AND THE SUNNI POPULATION 
------------------------------- 
¶6. (C) A Sunni human rights NGO leader related to REO staff 
that, "you helped us to get rid of Saddam, but you left us with 
a worse regime." Sunnis in Babil, he maintained, face daily 
discrimination at the hands of the local government and the PC. 
When asked to provide specific examples of discrimination, he 
stated that the government and the PC have been actively 
targeting Sunnis since the fall of the old regime.  The police 
in northern Babil, he explicated, purposefully arrest a son from 
every family, employ torture techniques worse than those used by 
Saddam's security forces, and have taken control of Sunni 
Mosques.  Furthermore, he argued that the current attempt by the 
PC to dissolve the Sunni-controlled Iskandariyah City Council 
only further demonstrates the PC's efforts to marginalize Sunni 
political participation in the province (ref A). 
 
------------------ 
THE PC VERSUS QAIS 
------------------ 
¶7. (C) The Sunni and secular Shi'a outrage concerning the 
alleged termination of General Qais Hamza Aboud Al-Momouri has 
 
HILLAH 00000091  002.2 OF 002 
 
 
also increased their suspicion about the activities and 
motivations of the SCIRI-dominated PC (ref C).  On May 13, Iraqi 
Police (IP) and military reports confirmed that a large 
demonstration of approximately three hundred to seven hundred 
people (mostly IPs) in support of Qais occurred in central 
Al-Hillah, the provincial capital.  The protest sparked fears 
within the Governor's administration of a possible IP mutiny, 
although first hand accounts indicate that the IPs remained 
mostly peaceful during the rally.  An Iraqi Police Lieutenant 
and supporter of Qais stated that a representative from the 
governor's office met with the protestors during the 
demonstration and told them that the Ministry of the Interior 
(MOI) had refused to endorse the PC decision to fire Qais. 
However, other reports received by the REO do not support this 
claim, and it is possible that the governor's office simply told 
the IPs this in order to convince them to disperse. 
 
¶8. (C) Individual policemen have stated that if the PC 
successfully fires the popular General, at least half of the 
Babil IPs will be forced to quit their jobs due to fear of 
reprisals and that SCIRI will have achieved its objective of 
taking control of the Babil security forces.  On multiple 
occasions, secular government officials including the Mayor of 
Al-Hillah, IP leadership and Qais himself have requested that 
the REO intervene on behalf of the besieged General.  It is 
interesting to note that in a strange twist of fate, northern 
Babil Sunni tribal sheikhs have voiced their public support for 
Qais (a Shi'a) to REO staff on two separate occasions (ref B). 
These individuals have also expressed to REO staff their 
frustration that the United States is not doing enough to help 
the General. 
 
¶9. (C) COMMENT: Clearly the Sunnis and secular Shi'a of Babil 
have legitimate reasons to feel frustrated with the current 
administration of the province.  The PC's maneuvering to augment 
their authority on the municipal level and garner power over the 
Babil security forces is only further estranging the PC from the 
province's non-Shi'a Islamist population.  The perception 
amongst Babil Sunnis and secular Shi'a is that the USG is 
unwilling to influence the political developments on the ground, 
whether through guaranteeing Qais' professional survival, 
rebuilding the province quickly, or reigning in the 
SCIRI-dominated PC, which only adds to their aggravation.  The 
proliferation of such a belief will certainly undermine the 
Coalition's credibility with these groups.  The REO and PRT 
continue to publicize to the PC, local civic groups and the 
population of Babil as a whole, through individual contacts and 
public diplomacy efforts, that the U.S. will support the 
province by cooperating on reconstruction efforts and assist the 
Iraqi government with helping them to establish democratic 
processes (septel).  END COMMENT. 
MEURS