TALLAFAR, Iraq (Army News Service, Oct. 28, 2003) -- Members of the newly elected Tallafar city council took the oath of office Oct. 25 at their city hall after one of only three truly democratic elections in the history of Iraq.

The previous voting method used by coalition forces in Iraq was a stepping-stone toward democracy, officials said. Authorities would select a panel of nominees beforehand, then the nominees would vote amongst themselves. Then between Oct. 15 and Oct. 22, the 187th Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) teamed with Iraqi citizens to conduct the first democratic elections held in Iraq since coalition forces have been in the country. The cities of Tallafar, Zumar and Al-Eyaldia in northern Iraq now have the first popularly elected city councils in the country, according to 187th commander Col. Michael Linnington.

Linnington and other members of the 187th met with elected councilmen from Zumar and Al-Eyaldia Oct. 24 to discuss initial difficulties following the elections. Khalid Abdo, a Zumar councilman and reporter for the Tallafar Today newsletter, said many of his fellow councilmen are still unclear on the notion of democracy.

“I am educated,” Abdo said, “and I know what democracy is. Many other councilmen know only dictatorship. It is not easy to teach independence when nobody here has lived it.”

Abdo and his fellow councilmen are discussing their city’s needs; education has been the major focus.

“Of course, all schools still need repairing, because the former regime let schools go to waste,” Abdo said. “But the really bad thing Saddam’s government did to schools was force them to support his ideals. Every day, schools all over Iraq would be forced to make their children stand up and say, ‘long live, Saddam.’ Now, they do it out of habit and the children get embarrassed when we tell them, ‘you don’t have to do this anymore.’”

“There are big problems with schools. Right now, there are 119 University of Mosul students who live in Avgani. The university doesn’t have rooms to live in, so the students are forced to go back and forth every day, or they have to pay for a hotel. Who has the money to pay for a hotel every day?”

Six men comprise the city council for Tallafar, while the Zumar and Al-Eyaldia councils have 21 each. In early November this number is expected to reduce to match Tallafar’s six, which Abdo said will dishearten many of the councilmen.

“It’s unfortunate that many of the candidates who just won a seat will have to give it up,” said Abdo, who will keep his seat past November. “It will really dishearten the council members, because they have such pride for being on the council now. The coalition should have done this before the elections, not now.”

Democracy remains highly misunderstood among council members, said

Maj. John Calahan, operations officer, 1st Bn., 187th Inf. Regt.

“Everybody that grew up here grew up in a dictatorship,” he said. “They don’t know democracy. The mayors don’t know what it means to be a mayor. His council will decide on something, and the mayor will say, ‘No. I’m the mayor, and I say no.’ We have to tell him, ‘Yeah, you’re the mayor – not the dictator.’”

But Calahan remains optimistic about the future of democracy in Iraq, because he sees most Iraqis as more than willing to learn and step into the new type of government. He said the key to bringing sovereignty from the biggest cities in Iraq to the smallest villages is by dispersing power equally among each region in Iraq.

“Under Saddam’s regime, everything was centralized,” Calahan said. “Centralized and segregated. All the ministries thought about was making Saddam happy. Because of this, the small towns and villages were left to fend for themselves. Back in the States, your water stops running and you call your city administration and ask ‘why the heck isn’t my water running?’ Here, you couldn’t do that, because all the power in the country was centralized.”

“You carry a very heavy burden,” Linnington said to the Zumar and Al-Eyaldia city council members. “But we believe in faith, and we will keep this faith in our friendship and your prosperity.”

(Editor’s note: Pfc. Chris Jones is a journalist with the 40th PAD.)