Searching Amara, A Folk Hero Falls
Ewa Jasiewicz

Occupied Amara 11/1/2004

It's a bright-cold Tuesday morning in Amara and a man who's too afraid to be named is talking to us frankly at a local kebab street caf. He's a former Daawa party activist and current member of the Union of Political Prisoners, a nationwide group formed to pick up the pieces, collectively, of the lives and pasts of some of Iraq's most obvious walking wounded. Regime-labelled as the enemies of Iraq; they were disfigured, thrown in acid, sliced open, stabbed with electric rods into involuntary limb flipping unconsciousness, stretched, torn, hammered and placed in rooms: dark rooms, dank rooms, rooms with floors turned black with freely and frequently spilt blood, rooms with hooks where a man would hang, broken shouldered in agony, rooms infested with cockroaches, rooms hidden underground unopened for decades, rooms locked behind urban underpasses, internees beaten daily in thick dank darkness to the sound of traffic streaming, the steady hum and sigh of cars passing by, life passing by to the daily corrosion and gnaw of being ignored, being so close to ordinary life but unable to see or touch it; and the insanity rooms, rooms painted red, bright red, with bright lights on every day, all day, for years.

Our friend had his house destroyed by the Baath, and had spent seven years of his life being dragged around different prisons. The Dictatorships most notorious intelligence torturers, the Fifth Brigade, smashed his head open in Rgadwania (he moves his hair back to show us the scar); the Mokhabarat (Secret Police) shattered his hand in Nassiriyah (he exposes a crippled, awkward right hand to us), and military intelligence beat his back out of shape in a Baghdad security cell.

Flimsy shirted teenage boys and keefaya wrapped white-stubbled old men are gathering closer to get a load of the talk. The subject is the course of events three days ago that left six men dead and 10 bleeding into the streets outside the governors office. The youths and older men start to draw near, others shift their chairs up, and a few low-key customers chew slowly, stare ahead and open their ears to listen.

'Unemployed youth came outside the city hall on Thursday. They'd been getting promises from the political parties for jobs. They'd lost all their patience. Most of them had been under pressure by the ex-regime, many had escaped from military service. The parties had told them that there'd be work for them from the governor. The governor told them he'd have jobs for them in two days.

On Saturday, more people joined up. They were faced by the Iraqi police who fired on them directly. Kareem Mahoud, the Governor, gave an order to the police and his militia to fire onto the crowd. After a short time, old Baathists started to join up. How do we know who they are? We know all of them. They used the situation to loot the city hall, looted the hospital beside it, the medical stores. The governor himself was shooting people - now he's in hiding. People are demanding he be removed and that his militia's be arrested.

We used to love him, he was a national hero, but when we realised he is working for the benefit of the British, we turned against him. One of his biggest mistakes is employing his family to take over Amara - using the same methods as Saddam Hussein. His cousin was killed in October by Amara people. He'd been made Chief of Police.

For the Governor, the judge, the local council of Amara, they were elected - how? We don't know. Noone elected them. The whole thing was a forgery.

Before 6 months, the population of Amara was low, people had escaped to Iran and further, but now theyve all returned. This raises the pressure on people becuase of the fact that theres not enough jobs. We have 75% unemployment. Many kids don't go to school. Its not that the schools were destroyed or there aren't enough teachers, its because theyre not convinced of it, they think theres no point. One of my kids quit after six years of school and noone can make him go back.

We were expecting the British to bring us work, a decent budget from Baghdad - for regeneration, for reconstruction. Everything needs rebuilding here - look around you - the streets, the drains, the hospitals. There's no pure water, no clean water. The British forces, we used to respect them, they were different from the Americans. But as a result for our respect, they went far in violating our traditions here. Take a look at Baghdad - there is a lot of killing, but not here. There will be soon, we are prepared to.

Bremer visited Nassiriyah, and set a budget - why not Amara? Amara has mercury and oil. We were ignored in the old time and we are being ignored again. Theyve made a big mistake ignoring Amara. And why didn't Blair visit us? People were mad that he didn't visit. We want to talk to Bremer, to ask him to begin reconstruction. And aid? So far, new organisations here have been stealing all of it. I used my machine gun just to get a blanket. Now my children have a blanket.'

'Khosh hachi' - 'Good Talk' is the all-round response. The neglect of poor southern governates, their debasement under the regime, pervasive persistent unemployment plus the filling of the power vacuum left gaping in May by anyone with enough machine guns has left a trail of frustration and desperation for most people in the south. Baath repression, particularly severe in the Daawa-roots south, the Iran and Kuawiti/US 1991 war and 13 years of sanctions have left the southern provinces worn out. The relief most people felt round these parts where the resistance to the regime was the strongest and best organised is giving way now, rapidly, to vehemence and street-battle expressed antagonism.

Kareem Mahood Mohammedawhi was a folk legend in the south for his canny resistance efforts against the Baath. Independent from any party, he managed to fake Saddam Hussein's own signature in 1991 on a release form and liberated 23 prisoners. He bombed the headquarters of the intelligence services of Basra three times, led attacks on military training camps, lived in the desert as a fugitive, and moved clandestinely between Iraq and Iran, transporting, weapons, ammo, information and ideas.

A friend recounts a famous story of how he managed to escape from a Mokhabarat Prison in Basra. Saddam Hussein had commanded that he be brought to Baghdad to be executed before him. Three dark tinted windowed intelligence cars, complete with national coverage antennaes, pulled up to Intelligence Service HQ. Agents entered the building, transfer papers in hand, took their prisoner and drove away smoothly. 30 minutes later three dark tinted windowed cars pulled up outside the Intelligence Service HQ. Agents exited, entered the building, transfer papers at the ready, only to find that they had already been and that Kareem Mahood had vanished. Upon hearing the news, Saddam Hussein passed an instant death sentence on the Head of Intelligence. He was executed immediately.

This story lends an insight into how much of a well organised and professional threat the resistance was. The Islamic Daawa Party, founded 1958, was the also one of the most organised and its armed wing the most militant carrying out a number of suicide operations and bomb attacks on ministries (famously the Ministry of Interior) and assassination attempts against the dictator himself and his sons. By 1980, the Daawa had become such a threat that The 'Revolutionary Command Council' of the Iraqi regime passed Decree 461 meaning death for all those active within or were affiliated, sympathised or supported the IDP. The hunt for and murder of Daawa party members and also any Daawa-labeled dissidents or those who fell out of favour with their local neighbourhood watch cell police, was carried out by Special Security, General Security, General Intelligence, Military Intelligence and Military Security operatives. Its worth remembering that a third of the population of Iraq was employed by the regime in some kind of security/surveillance capacity. Thousands of Daawa party members were killed and tortured under the regime, with opponent leaders such as Muhammad Baqir al Sadr. Sadr was viewed as a visionary philosopher after he wrote the highly influential works Falsafatuna (Our Philosophy, 1958) and Iqtisaduna (Our Economics) representing the first Islamic theory of modern political economy. He also issued a Fatwa prohibiting Iraqi Shiites from joining the Baath party in 1979, earning him house arrest by the regime and then execution the following year.

We have to leave. People around us are saying its not safe to be out. Yesterday two female journalist - one of them Croatian - were allegedly beaten 'hard' during the demonstration and had to be taken into British Army protection. Our friend comes with us and guides our fear-gripped driver to Al Sadr Hospital. Here our friend implores us not to mention him or anything he said as 'These are Kareem Mahood's people'. He then leaves us, a bundle of nerves.

We visit the coronor. Rahim Hanoon Adiel, 35, and Mahour Abdel Wahad, 18, - both shot in the head, and Mohammad Jasim Greyed, 18, shot in the stomach, were brought in yesterday (Saturday January 10). Hit with live ammo, the police or the governor himself, were shooting to kill, not disable or disarm, but kill directly. The type of bullet, we are told, is unknown as all the bullets which hit the victims exited.

We are informed by Dr Ali Abdel Aziz Shaawi, the Hospital's General Surgeon, that British military investigators had been to visit just minutes before us and had taken the names and addresses of those killed. It is their responsibility under the European Convention on Human Rights 1950 to conduct a swift investigation into any civilian killing involving the army. The ECHR 1950 is best placed law to sue the British Army for negligence as British law and the International Criminal Court require the signature of the Attorney General before proceedings can be taken. Given that over 1000 people, mostly Black people, have been murdered in Police custody since 1969 in the UK and No officer has ever been convicted of murder, with just a handful ever even being prosecuted, the likelihood of the Attorney General accepting cases against the British Military is low.

We drive up to the Town Hall, Kareem Mahoods office. Our driver is really agitated now because someone stole a couple of his headlight covers. He wants get out of Amara. Its getting late (12pm) and the road is notoriously unsafe out after midday. Approaching the scene of yesterday's riot, we see a group of about 15 teenagers trying to smash up a window and drainpipe on the side of the building. A police pickup guards the front door. An irate but small and knackered looking crowd of about 15 are round the front, milling around outside huge locked gates. The atmosphere is gripped. A small wiry geezer swaggers up to us and tells us to 'be careful, two journalists got beaten up here yesterday'. Turns out he's a friend of our translator, they know eachother from the Bettoween gangster hood in central Baghdad, so he gets in our car, we drive to a nearby park and he tells us what he saw yesterday in a ratteled-out, racing details.

'Kareem Mahood's brother Riyad wanted to leave (the Town Hall). The crow were throwing molotovs and stones on the Town Hall. Ryad was guarded by a militia. Kareem Mahood turned up with his gang and five pickups - seven men in each. He was in a large white car. He got out of the car and began to use his Machine gun on the crowd He's a criminal. He shot three people. He took his brother and headed for the British base. A helicopter turned up, 2 APCs, 15 jeeps, and the British with plastic shields. They shot rubber bullets. Iraqi police disappeared behind troop lines. The fight resumed. Because it took all day, the British were taking turns in shifts. A lot happened but its not been written about or shown on TV.

Kareem Mahood is using the same methods as Saddam. All of his tribe are employed in the police force or government positions. The same thing happened here in the summer. I can't specify what month but 2-3 people were killed. He's taken money, stolen fuel, he's controlling all the fuel. He's even been involved in dealing hashish by college students. Nobody knows where he is now but if he's seen in Amara he'll be killed. Some people say he's in Baghdad, other that he's at his house and other that he's being protected by the British in a military base. We just don't know.'

When we bid him farewell he tells us, 'You can't leave now, don't be leaving Amara now, its not safe, the road's not safe'. It's 1pm and beautiful day. We brave it anyway.

Back in Basra, when asked about the incident involving Mahood, Dominic D'angelo, Director of Press and Public Affairs, CPA South is clueless. 'No one knows anything about this at all down here, and it seems unlikely to say the least'. He added that Amara police had not said anything about the incident either, but that he would be checking locally about the incident to obtain further information. The police are controlled by the Governor. Mahood's brother was former chief of police, its all 'in the family' or rather the tribe, and its unlikely any officer will open up a chasm of worms by speaking out against his employer or the dominant tribe. Its unsurprising that CPA South isn't hearing the word on the street, with staff holed up 24-hours a day in what is effectively a large open topped concrete bunker. However, tribal leaders are all talking about it at the Democratic Gathering of Iraqi Tribes in Basra, his own tribe, the Mohammedawhi, is supporting him and conducting tribal meetings with the relatives of the deceased. Other tribal leaders think he should and must be killed. And its a well-known scandal in hotels, shops, tea-stalls, on the streets, the word is out: The Governor of Amara, one a folk hero, has lost the plot. He shot into a crowd of unarmed demonstrators, is considered to be a 'Jaysous' (collaborator), 'Haraami' (Thief) and has become a wanted man, a fugitive once again, this time from the people, from bottom up rather than the top dictatorship down.

A portion of responsibility for Mahoud's appointment, his alleged shooting spree and the accountability for the Iraqi police force - subservient at the end of the day to British commands - lies with the British Occupation. The steps they are taking to cultivate a culture of accountability remain to be seen but if the Governor can open fire on demonstrators, and the official word from CPA is 'We don't know anything about it, we don't think it actually happened' then the system is in bad shape. Over 30,000 people took to the streets in Basra a few days ago demanding swift and fair elections. People want to be able to elect their own representatives and remove them when they get flagrantly screwed over. And if people like Kareem Mahood start to reproduce the authoritarian, mafia-like and murderous modes of clinging on to their own power, like the Baath, then people will tear them down unceremoniously.