Democracy
In Jordan?
By
Toujan Faisal and Ian Urbina
Znet
July 07, 2003
(AMMAN, Jordan) When Washington
cites examples of the potential for reform and democracy in the Arab
world, Jordan is one of the first countries mentioned. For the first
time since 1997, Jordanians went to the polls last month to vote for
parliament, and by most accounts the elections went smoothly. Voter
turnout topped 52% and stability was maintained, with a clear majority
of the seats going to pro-government candidates. Islamists, though they
later questioned the outcome, added credibility to the process by taking
part in the elections rather than boycotting them. In the end they captured
only 17 out of 110 seats, far fewer than expected. Jordanian women took
a step forward, with six parliamentary spots specially set aside for
females.
These were important developments,
but Jordan is still a long way off from embracing true democratic reform.
In June 2001, when the prime
minister disbanded the last parliament, he hijacked the legislative
process and began governing by fiat. He put politics and dissent on
a short leash and refashioned the electoral process so that it would
be far from representative. Consequently, although Jordan has finally
returned its parliament to session, the country is in many ways further
away from being a functioning democracy than it was two years ago.
At the heart of the problem
are the "temporary laws" the Jordanian government has decreed
over the last two years at dizzying speed. These laws are constitutionally
permitted only when parliament is not in session and the "essential
security needs" of the nation demand them. By disbanding the parliament
and putting the country into a sustained state of high alert, the present
government opened the way for unfettered drafting of these laws. Between
1930 and 1999, only 60 such temporary laws were decreed. In the last
two years, the government has implemented 184.
The temporary laws contain
a wide range of domestic restrictions. Public gatherings require a three-day-advance
permit, which is almost never given. Criticism of "friendly"
nations is a crime prosecuted before a military court. Reporters who
write stories critical of the government now face much harsher penalties
-- up to three years in prison. Misdemeanor convictions come with no
right to appeal. Civil servants are prevented from signing petitions
that might reflect poorly on the state.
Temporary laws have also
been used to gerrymander electoral districts to favor the regime. In
expanding the parliament's size from 80 to 110 seats, the regime watered
down its critics by concentrating the new seats in the south and west
where regime support is strong. The north and central voting districts,
where the bulk of the Palestinian population resides, are sorely underrepresented.
Estimates released by Fawzi Samhouri, director of the Jordan Society
for Citizens' Rights, a pro-democracy group that authorities dissolved
last year, are revealing. They show, for example, that Amman has roughly
one parliament member for each 52,255 voters, whereas the city of Karak,
hometown of the government's interior minister, has a parliament member
for every 6,000 voters.
The Bush administration,
which values its close relationship with the King Abdullah II and wants
Jordan to continue to run smoothly, will be tempted to look the other
way rather than pressure its ally to honestly reckon with these unfair
and restrictive temporary laws. But to promote real democracy in the
Arab world, the U.S. needs to begin encouraging its regional allies
to tolerate internal opposition from all sides and give it a legitimate
outlet in free and fair democratic elections. Otherwise, dissenters
will tend to boycott the ballot box, heading underground and becoming
more radicalized in the process.
None of this takes away from
the fact that the restoration of parliamentary elections in Jordan was
an essential move forward, one important both to Abdullah and the Bush
administration. Jordanians headed to the polls only days before the
opening of the World Economic Forum near Amman. As one of the few Arab
nations with a free-trade agreement with the United States, Jordan is
a model of the sort of economic hopes for the region that U.S. Trade
Representative Robert Zoellick promoted at these meetings. Fiery and
anti-Western political rhetoric from Jordanian campaigners -- or a different
outcome in the balloting -- would certainly have cast a gloomy shadow
over the ambitions of the Jordanian government and the Bush administration
for increased regional trade and foreign investment.
The elections also held significance
for the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. Jordan is one
of the United States' closest friends in the Arab world in part because
of its willingness to engage in dialogue with Israel. This was the first
time since the king took office in 1999 that Jordanian citizens, 60%
of whom are Palestinian, could vote. They did so as Secretary of State
Colin L. Powell, just across the border, worked arduously to keep forward
momentum in the sputtering "road map," which has the strong
support of Abdullah but has engendered deep skepticism from most Jordanians,
whose ballots could have been used as a referendum on the issue.
The fact that the elections
weren't turned into such a referendum should be seen as good news for
Jordan's government. Perhaps now, with a little external pressure, it
will be willing to facilitate public discussion of the many temporary
laws, since not even the new parliamentarians possess a complete list
of them. Removing the overly restrictive limitations on press freedom
would also be an important prerequisite for restoring government transparency
and opening a public debate about the validity of these laws. The prime
minister and others in the government who were most directly involved
with the disbanding of the parliament and the repeated postponements
of parliamentary elections should be held accountable for their unconstitutional
actions. These would be small but crucial first steps in putting Jordan
back on the path toward true democratization.
But by far the most important
challenge lies immediately ahead. The next parliament is supposed to
review every one of the temporary laws and decide whether to accept
or reject each. It's clear that the political deck has been stacked
with pro-regime types. Now we'll see whether the new parliament will
be able to overcome that and do what is right: begin the across-the-board
reversal of those laws that are most anti-democratic.
[Toujan Faisal was, in 1993,
the first woman to win a seat in the, Jordanian parliament. Last year
she was imprisoned for four months, after accusing the government of
corruption. Ian Urbina is associate editor at the Middle East Research
and Information Project in Washington, DC]