Amman for all seasons
The new Jordanian prime minister is trying to convince a sceptical opposition that the government's promises of inclusion are the real deal, reports Sana Abdallah from Amman
Since Jordan's King Abdullah II chose Faisal Al-Fayez to head a new cabinet on 25 October, the new prime minister has focussed on domestic social, political and economic reforms.
Al-Fayez, a close confidant of the king since he assumed the Hashemite throne in February 1999, launched his premiership by trying to bridge rifts between the government and opposition forces, led by the powerful Islamic Action Front (IAF), the political arm of the Muslim Brotherhood movement.
On 5 November, the prime minister met with the 17 IAF members of the 110-seat lower house of parliament in an overt effort to restore dialogue with the Islamic group that has been greatly marginalised in the past few years despite its grassroots influence in the kingdom.
To break the ice, Al-Fayez told the Islamists that the government had "respect" for the Islamic movement and that he intended to maintain open channels with them to "work together as a team" towards "greater political freedoms". Going further, he invited the Islamist lawmakers to provide "clear solutions and programmes to assist the government in overcoming all [domestic] problems".
He promised to work with parliament, elected in June after a two-year delay, on "modern elections and political parties laws that would contribute to the political development" of the country.
The opposition, a 14-party coalition led by the IAF, which also includes leftists and pan-Arab nationalists, have for years called for a parliamentary election law based on fair representation according to demography, rather than geography. In other words, they want to allocate a greater number of seats in parliament for the more densely populated constituencies in order to reach a more accurate representation of the country's population, more than half of which is of Palestinian origin.
The opposition has complained that since the 1993 elections, the law and distribution of parliamentary seats have guaranteed victory for pro-establishment tribal leaders that have turned the past two parliaments into rubber stamps for the government. The law, as well as other legislation they deemed restrictive, prompted the IAF and other opposition groups to boycott the 1997 general elections, further marginalising them politically.
Al-Fayez's meeting with the IAF was followed by similar dialogues with other parliamentary blocs -- opposition, pro-establishment and independent -- during which he asked for their ideas on encouraging greater participation in decision making.
On Monday, Al-Fayez met with active members of the country's political and civic institutions, including the state-run and independent press and women's groups, to solicit ideas on how to bring about greater freedoms and participation by all sectors of society.
The prime minister's visit to the Professional Association Complex earlier this month was among his most important, during which he spoke with the councils of the 14 syndicates, which the previous government of Prime Minister Ali Abul-Ragheb had dissolved more than a year ago on charges of illegal political activities.
Al-Fayez's comment that the syndicates "have an important role that should rise in terms of political development" was good news to union leaders who faced continuous threats by the previous government to dissolve the 100,000-member syndicates if they continued their political activities.
More than a year ago, the unions' anti-normalisation with Israel committee published a black list of normalisers. The committee was disbanded and its leaders, foremost among them was Ali Abu Sukkar, were arrested on the grounds that the anti-Israeli activities, though peaceful, were "harming the national economy and scaring off investors".
Abu Sukkar, who won a seat as an IAF legislator in the new Parliament, was acquitted by a Jordanian court on 26 October -- the ninth anniversary of the signing of the unpopular peace treaty with Israel -- of "seditious libel" charges filed by a Jordanian publisher whose name appeared on the black list.
The court's decision, which came one day after the new government was sworn in, was generally seen by the opposition as a genuine act by the government to grant greater political freedoms, even though the Jordanian judiciary is supposed to be independent.
While the new government's mandate is to focus on domestic political issues, its foreign policy remains the same, including its commitment to the 1994 peace treaty with Israel. Officials have indicated that the issue of public freedoms that have steadily regressed since 1994 would be addressed.
The prime minister told the country's political and civic leaders that his government could not meet their demands to revoke the peace treaty, but insisted that its "commitment to international accords would not have any adverse effects on the Jordanian citizen".
Minister of State and government spokesperson Asma Khader, who was a passionate civil and women's rights activist and lawyer when she agreed to join the new government last month, told Al-Ahram Weekly that her government's position on normalisation was different than that of its predecessors.
Khader, who opposed normalisation with Israel, said her government believes the "Jordanian street, individuals and civil society have the right to choose" whether to normalise or not, while the "government deals realistically with its international commitments".
Analysts said that granting more public freedoms meant reigning in the mukhabarat, or intelligence services, which have been the main actors in imposing restrictions, detaining activists and censoring the press.
Khader defended the role of the security services as "important and basic, especially in light of the political circumstances", but vowed that the "approach that was sometimes used in chasing people for what they say" would not be employed any longer.
She said the new government was not merely paying lip service to freedom during Al-Fayez's intensive meetings with the country's civil society, and insisted that it was "committed to raising the ceiling of freedoms, respecting human rights and political pluralism". She added that restrictive laws were being reviewed "to pave the way for more participation, the details of which are being discussed with political parties, civil society and parliament, which are all being asked to give their input".
