By Khaled Abu Al Khair
Albawaba.com - Amman
The Jordanian government has aroused considerable controversy with its plan to merge the councils of various municipalities, leading to the resignation of Islamist mayors and members of town councils.
Islamist opponents have been particularly vocal, as they perceive the move as undercutting their domination of a number of municipalities including Zarqa, Jordan’s second largest city.
Spokesmen of the movement have decried both the mergers and the postponement of parliamentary elections until August 2002, calling them the beginnings of a retreat from democracy.
The secretary general of the Islamist Action Front, Abdel Latif Arabiyyat, said the local administration was "the real representative of the nation, through which it practices democracy in all its aspects.”
“The principle of appointing the municipality heads contradicts the educational and cultural development that our country is witnessing,” added Arabiyyat, whose party is an arm of the Muslim Brotherhood.
Observers say the Islamist campaign is an attempt to flex their political muscles ahead of next year’s parliamentary elections, given the government ban on demonstrations, sit-ins and festivals in support of the Al Aqsa Inifada and other forms of solidarity with the Palestinians.
The Islamists reportedly give much weight to municipalities, as they enable them to interact with their constituencies and provide services to local communities. This, according to observers, constitutes an effective mechanism to win votes, which the government may want to limit.
In view of the fact that political and municipal services overlap in this issue, Albawaba.com interviewed Minister of Municipalities Abdel Razzaq Tbaishat.
Following are excerpts from the interview:
Q. What is the objective of the mergers?
A. The objective is to have highly effective municipalities from the administrative and technical points of view, in order to provide the public with better services. The municipalities are facing crises, particularly their long-running financial problems.
Following a thorough study, the government decided that mergers were necessary to solve the various problems, which constitute obstacles and have consequences for the services which municipalities provide.
Q. You have been the minister of municipalities many times before. Why mergers this time?
A. Actually, the idea is not a new one, since I proposed it in 1991 when I was a minister. It falls under the Municipality Law for 1994, which permits restructuring.
Q. Islamists are concerned that they may be targeted by this project. Are they accusing the government of abandoning a democratic election principle to replace it with the appointment of officials for the municipalities?
A. There won’t be appointments, by law, because members and heads of the municipal councils will be directly elected by the public. I have explained this more than once, but the Islamists insist that we will appoint the municipalities’ officials. They insist on this, despite the fact that they know that there are no appointments because their objective is political.
I’ll say it again, that we will neither amend the law nor target the Islamists or others, and what is going on is just a reform and development process in everybody’s interests.
Q. What about reports of public opposition to the mergers?
A. There are some people who have an interest in spreading such news. Actually, 95 percent of the people support the project because it aims at providing them with better services.
Q. But hasn’t an objection to the mergers been filed with the Ajloun governorate?
A. Those who objected are the heads of the merged municipalities. The objections have, by the way, been nominal and the whole subject has been resolved.
Q. There are some people who link the municipalities issue and the postponement of the parliamentary elections, and express their concern over what they describe as a retreat from democracy.
A. There is no link between the two issues. The parliamentary elections postponement has its own circumstances, but the mergers are aimed at creating a strong structure for the municipalities to help them secure the funds for the provision of better services. I’ll say it once more: the government is committed to running the municipal council elections after the mergers are finished.
