ELECTORAL REFORM CHATTER INCREASES IN JORDAN

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 AMMAN 000718

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/25/2019
TAGS: PGOV KDEM JO
SUBJECT: ELECTORAL REFORM CHATTER INCREASES IN JORDAN
FOLLOWING CABINET RESHUFFLE

REF: A. 08 AMMAN 3353

B. 08 AMMAN 3002

C. 08 AMMAN 1834

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Classified By: Ambassador R. Stephen Beecroft
for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d).


1. (C) Summary: Electoral reform, long the primary goal of
reform politicians in Jordan, is a hot topic of discussion
following a cabinet reshuffle on February 23. PM Nader
Al-Dahabi has since declared his intention to put Jordan's
controversial electoral law on the table for discussion or
possible amendment. Meanwhile in parliament, the
business-oriented Ikha bloc is preparing an electoral reform
strategy in the hopes of making it the group's signature
issue. While the talk may ultimately lead nowhere, the
discussion is reaching higher levels than before -- an
indication of the rising importance politicians and average
Jordanians place on the issue. End Summary.

Winds of Change?
--------------


2. (C) As currently formulated, Jordan's electoral law uses
gerrymandering and disproportionate allocation of
parliamentary seats to maximize representation of rural East
Bankers at the expense of urban Palestinians. (Note: The
rural, East Banker town of Karak has a representative in
parliament for every 6,800 residents, while predominantly
Palestinian Amman has a representative in parliament for
every 11,000 residents. End Note.) Past efforts at
electoral reform have been shut down by the same conservative
politicians and government officials who benefit from the law
(see refs A and B for the most recent examples). The
legislation was implemented in 2001 without parliamentary
approval as a provisional statute and as such can
theoretically be placed on parliament's calendar at any time
without prior approval from the government, which otherwise
introduces all legislation (Ref C). The many critics of the
law assert that it creates weak, unrepresentative parliaments
that quash necessary reforms in favor of tribal interests.
Pro-establishment politicians and officials quietly tell us
that a fairer electoral law would result in significant gains
for Palestinian-origin candidates and Islamists -- a
situation they believe would negatively impact internal
stability by allowing non-East Bankers a role in
decision-making.


3. (U) Following the February 23 reshuffle of the Dahabi
cabinet, electoral reform has re-emerged as a public topic of
discussion. During the first meeting of the new cabinet on
February 24, PM Dahabi publicly declared his intention to
"reconsider laws that regulate political life in Jordan."
Government spokesman Nabil Al-Sharif and Minister for
Political Development Musa Ma'aytah subsequently declared
that the government would engage in a dialogue with civil
society, political parties, and other institutions about
possible changes in Jordan's electoral law.

The Best Laid Plans
--------------


4. (C) Prior to the cabinet reshuffle, Legal Committee Chair
Mubarak Abbadi told poloff that the Ikha bloc would make
electoral reform its signature issue in 2009. (Note: Ikha
is composed of around twenty young, business-oriented,
primarily East Banker MPs who are cautiously pro-reform. End
Note.) Ikha is planning to mount a campaign within the
parliament to bring the electoral law forward to the
parliament for revision and approval. Jordanian media
recently reported an Ikha memo to lower house speaker
Abdulhadi Al-Majali asking him to put the electoral law on
the agenda for an expected extraordinary session of
parliament this summer. On March 4, lower house speaker
Abdulhadi Majali rejected Ikha's request, telling mainstream
daily Al-Ghad that the issue would require "extensive
discussion" and was linked to the King's decentralization
plan, which is still on the drawing board (Refs A and B).


5. (C) According to Abbadi, Ikha will propose amendments to
the electoral law, which will result in "substantial
improvement" without upsetting pro-establishment political
groups. The bloc is looking at a mixed system of
representation based on district and provincial
representation, which would maintain current electoral
districts but reduce their representation in parliament to
one MP per district. In addition to voting for a candidate
in the local district, voters would also cast a ballot for
candidates in their governorate. The number of seats
allocated to the twelve governorates would be based on
population, meaning that representation of the Amman

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governate (and its largely Palestinian-origin population)
would increase. (Note: In the current system, there are
forty-five electoral districts in which each voter casts a
ballot for one candidate in the voter's multi-member
district. End Note.) Ikha's approach is designed to mollify
East Bank conservatives by retaining elements of the current
system while addressing the imbalance in representation for
urban Jordanians, most of whom are Palestinian.

Comment
--------------


6. (C) The King's silence on electoral reform is largely
interpreted by proponents and opponents of electoral change
as approval of the system as it stands. Even so, the current
round of talk about electoral reform shows that some of the
political elite are looking for ways to engage practically on
the issue. The Ikha effort is interesting in that it
presents a proposal for debate. That being said, the
proposal as it stands will likely be defeated by the
establishment keen to protect its control over the levers of
government as well as the conception of East Banker identity.
Beecroft