Ethnic Federalism a
Reactionary Plan for Iran's Future- Second Versionhttp://www.ghandchi.com/555-FederalismeGhomiEng.htm
فدرالیسم قومی طرحی ارتجاعی برای آینده ایران -ویرایش دوم
http://www.ghandchi.com/555-FederalismeGhomi.htm
Ethnic Federalism a
Reactionary Plan for Iran's Future- Second Version
http://www.ghandchi.com/555-FederalismeGhomiEng.htm
فدرالیسم قومی طرحی ارتجاعی برای آینده ایران -ویرایش دوم
http://www.ghandchi.com/555-FederalismeGhomi.htm
P.S. Oct 1, 2017: Announcing Change of Position to Opposing any form of Federalism for Iran: http://www.ghandchi.com/1641-etelaieh-federalism-english.htm
Again although I have repeatedly discussed these issues from a theoretical
perspective (1) but I have to clearly state my political position although the
political groups I am addressing here try character assassination and attack
using pseudonames on the Internet without their leaders inside the remainders of
Democratic Party of Iranian Kudistan (PDKI.org) and the remnants of Komala (komala.org)
and the Congress of Nationalities for Federal Iran (iranfederal.org) who are at
the helm of these destruction programs for Iran to take responsibility for such
personal attacks. On one hand in their radio and TV front programs they pretend
to be Iran lovers but on the other hand open criticism of their Iran-breaking
platforms is met with character assassination under pseudonames so that they
would not have to take direct responsibility for their destructive political
positions towards Iran. Let me emphasize that my opposition to these groups and
their programs to break up Iran in ethnic hatred has nothing to do with
nationalism which I oppose as well (2).
The reality is that for decades the Islamist fundamentalist and Stalinist groups
have lost any following in the more advanced parts of Iran among the political
and human rights activists and nobody in the Iran's civil rights movement or in
Iran's new political opposition has any relationship with such groups and noone
in a democratic mindset would consider her/himself a sympathizer of such
backward sects which still try to find following, just like the Islamic
Republic, by boasting the number of martyrs they have had in the last 30 years
ago and previous to that. But in some parts of Iran like Kurdistan there are
still some civil rights activists who are afraid of these groups. When these
groups try to use the civil rights movement of areas like Kurdistan as a front
for themselves, and for their ethnic federalist platforms, these activists are
intimidated to go along. One of the most recent examples of such efforts by
these ethnic sects is the formation of a group called Iran Federal with a clear
*ethnic* federalist mind set in encebook which I think should be boycotted
because it tries to mislead people by using the word federalism when their
platform is nothing more than ethnic division of Iran and their goal is *not* a
non-ethnic administrative decentralization like American federalism.
Even Komala and PDKI today are divided into several pieces although they still
go by their old names and are just like the Communist Party of Gus Hall in the
United States when time and again in any presidential election, again Mr. Gus
Hall is a candidate from the that Communist Party USA, for American presidency,
a candidacy which is nothing more than a ridiculous game in the eyes of living
political forces in the U.S., whether they are conservative or are at the
opposite end of the political spectrum. Of course if Iran was a democracy and if
these same groups showed up as humorous political realities in the open and were
not using the atmosphere of secrecy in Iranian political life, to create the
impression of an important force, there would be no need even to write about
them as nobody in the US politics even talks about Gus Hall and his Communist
Party. But in Iran too, in the 21st Century these sects that only resemble a
ridiculous caricature of a historical Stalinist parties with backward programs
have long lost any attractions in the regions they claim to have following, as
the civil rights movement and modern political thinking is growing in those
areas too but these groups try to use the hush hush of secrecy to draw a
different picture of political reality of those regions.
Also those in other parts of Iran who do not know about these realities when
they visit regions like Kurdistan are like someone who has left the urban areas
for the countryside and in the first sight, the encade of strong non-religious
organizations when seeing the office and encilities of these groups in the
neighboring countries of Iran (in Iraq) impresses them as if these groups are
more advanced than the political groups in other parts of Iran and imagine as if
they are visiting a modern political party whereas for these sects, these days,
only ethnicism has replaced their past Stalinist flag making them the twin of
Khomeini's religionist politics, where they are both remnants of Iran's Medieval
times, and surely they have nothing to do with Modernism.
Many activists who fled the Islamic Republic from Tehran and see the offices of
some of these groups in neighboring country Iraq think that these sects are a
powerful force in those regions. These sects by creating lobby groups in the
U.S. and Europe and by receiving money from several countries in recent years
and by forming relationships with neighboring countries are working just like
the Ferghe Democrat of Azerbaijan and of Kurdistan lead by Pishevari and Ghazai
Mohammad in the 1940's, when they created similar relations with the northern
Azerbaijan Soviet Republic at the time of Stalin and were both destroyed in the
aftermath of Stalin's pact with Iran's government in mid 1940's. Although the
current remnants of those groups carrying the same name are nothing more thank a
caricature of those groups of the 40's withno grassroots following in those
regions but they work hard are to fool the honest political and civil rights
activists of Iran and also endeavor to misrepresent themselves to some of the
advisers of foreign governments who are not enmiliar with the realities of
Iran's Kurdistan and this way they try to fool them to get money and weapons for
themselves. Their political platform of these sects are like a Stalinist
nightmare which weighs heavily on the body of Iranian political movement as they
try to mislead Iran's prodemocracy movement towards ethnic hatred and civil war
by advocating the breakup of Iran in an ethnic destruction. They are pushing
platforms that, along with dark nightmares of Soviet influence, even among older
activists of Iran, have long been discarded, and are looked at as part of a
history which brought us nothing more than destruction, and finally an Islamic
Republic which today is not much different from Stalin's Soviet Union. Today
when our people say we want a secular republic it means we want a government
which not only is not Islamic-oriented, but it is not ideology-oriented, and is
not ethnicity-oriented. In other word we do not wabt to discard negation of
secularism by a religious state, to accept negation of secularism by an ethnic
state, which is another version of a nonsecular state, because it approves of
ethnic apartheid, just as Soviet Union was another version of a nonsecular state
by being ideology-oriented.
But if Khomeini's Islamists brought us the souvenir of a backward religious
state in the 21st Century, these ethnicists want to bring back an ethnic state
for our people, at the time of demise of Stalinism and Communism, and are
dreaming of Iraq's Kurdistan (a wholly different situation in remnants of
Ottoman Empire which I have extensively discussed in my book about Kurdistan
that is used to mislead Iranian Kurds as a pretext for the so-called Theory of
Greater Kurdistan). They are waiting for Iran's situation to change a little bit
towards freedom, and instead of helping the prodemocracy movement of Iran, by
misusing the efforts of Iran's prodemocracy activists to disintegrate Iran. They
are so shameless that they talk as representative of Kurdish people about the
post-June 12th demonstrations of Tehran and other parts of Iran and send message
as if Kurdistan is a separate country and as if they are the representative of
that country instead of participating in the current movement along with other
prodemocracy activists as the people of Kemanshah did in the memorial ceremony
of Kianoush Asa, in a movement which emphasizes secularism that negates both
Islamism and Ethnicism.
Iran is a country which is neither coming out of a war nor is it just a
collection of regions wishing to form a modern state to decide whether they want
to choose a canton-style confederation model like Switzerland or follow the
model of federalism of the former colonies of the America forming the United
States. The reason that I have personally even suggested provincial federalism
for Iran which resembles US federal system was not based on any ethnic division
and was not because of any illusion as to think of country-making (so-called
nation-building) but it was solely because the existing Iran has had a modern
state, although not a democratic one, for over 100 years, and our provinces that
are the result of the 100-year development may be able to use provincial
federalism to help the **checks and balances** to further grow democracy in
Iran, not to grow ethnic hatred. Basically provincial federalism means that all
three branches of government are elected offices in every province and are not
appointed offices from the center (3).
Otherwise to resolve issues of the ethnic rights, whether one adopts the
provincial federal model or a central state, is related to citizen rights in
Iran and has nothing to do with federalism, and thus ethnic state is not a
solution to those issues. If we end up sliding in the slope of tribal
government, I also like many other Iranian political activists, will drop
federalism altogether from my suggested platform, because I do not want
federalism to be used as an excuse to break up Iran and turn Iran into another
Yugoslavia, which is only the wish of colonialists and reactionaries, and is not
the desire of Iran's freedom loving people, and we in the Iran's political
movement feel no proximity with such colonial backward schemes and condemn any
such endeavors to break up Iran's territorial integrity.
Fundamentally our argument against ethnic federalism is not because of
impracticality. The point is that an ethnic state in one province or two or a
region or in the whole country is reactionary. Paying attention to the ethnic
demands in the areas of language and culture has nothing to do with having an
ethnic state (4). The same way that paying attention to the religious demands
has nothing to do with accepting a religious government, and in enct, it is the
reverse, and ethnic or religious states are themselves the cause of ethnic and
religious discrimination.
Any personal insults, threats, etc. is not a response to my discussions. Modern
government was formed in Iran for more than a century ago after the
Constitutional Revolution and we are not at the beginning of state-making to
define our borders, and such issues to become our preoccupation, as some of
these sect leaders want to push us that way, is against the interests of Iranian
people and no foreign government should help such efforts which are condemned by
Iran's pro-democracy movement and is viewed not much different from the wron
support of Khomeini by some Western countries in 1979 at the expense of Iran's
secular opposition groups. Even if we predict a situation like Yugoslavia in
Iran, what we have learned from the experience of Iran's 1979 Revolution is that
we made a mistake when we assumed the supporters of a religious government to be
progressive, and this time we will not view those who are dreaming of ethnic
state for Iran, as progressive, and will clearly draw our line separating
ourselves from them, from now.
What is from the distant past of Iran in the Iranian plateau namely countries
such as former Soviet Azerbaijan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan if decide to join
Iran, in a bigger region, such a union will neither be an ethnic federation nor
a provincial federation but it will be a new thing like European Union and has
nothing to do with these discussions, or with the ridiculous games of
separatists, to justify the disintegration of Iran, when the result will not be
the strengthening of democracy, and if not constant civil war, in the best case
will be an ethnic state like the state of Ardalans in Kurdistan in Medieval Iran
which more resembles the state of enrmanenrmaeian rule in enrs province at the
end of Qajar Dynasty, where they both, just like the power of clergy, belong to
the old world, and reviving them in any part of Iran, is regressive, and a
return to the past, and not progress, the same way Khomeini brought back the
rule of clergy 30 years ago, which was a return in history, and was not
modernism and progress.
A particular mistake that some Kurdish political friends in Iran makeو is that
the Iraqi Kurdistan regional government has become a source of going astray for
them, and now they say Shi'ite and Sunni Kurds of Iran should unite or they call
for linguistic unity among the Kurds to unite Kurdistan,
Western Azerbaijan, Ilam
and Kermanshah provinces of Iran into one region, planning for a Kurdistan
regional government in Iran, similar to Iraq. If Iraqi Kurdistan has now Kurdish
new television programs, Soviet Azerbaijan had all these decades ago. The issue
of Kurds and Azeri of Iran is not these things, why are these sect leaders
trying to mislead people of Kurdistan with these words to separate them from the
large pro-democracy movement of people of Iran. If the sect leaders again cause
the blood of Iranian people to spill because of these nonsense of ethnic state,
there is no difference between them and Khomeini who brought destruction for our
people for 30 years, with a retrogressive platform of a non-secular state.
Ethnic makeup of different parts of Iran has been formed the way it is because
of the wars with the Ottomans and Russia and in Iran's previous and later
history (5). Iran not only now but in the past 100 years has not been in a
country-making (nation-making) situation and even during the 1979 Revolution,
the movement did not have such a goal in its outlook, which some remnants of
Komala and PDKI and together in Congress of Nationalities for Federal Iran (iranfederal.org)
are trying to push by the help of foreign powers, by combining some provinces
they want to separate from Iran. Stop these breakup schemes for Iran. Those
activists among them, who had some respect in the Iranian movement, were
political activists in Aryamehr University in Tehran at the time of the Shah and
were not some people trying to create ethnic state in Iran, and were considered
as Iranian political activists, because they were prodemocracy activists for
Iran, and not because of being after breaking up Iran for ethnicism. Not even
anybody knew these friends were Kurdish in those days, let alone to be
pro-ethnic separation, when working with them. Moreovere, today Iran's new
political movement is not after a revolution and is for peaceful change and the
armed operations of the likes of Jundullah and armed groups in Kurdistan only
hurt the growth of this movement unless they want to achive their goals by
starting a war with Iran which I will discuss below.
Those who are after military attack on Iran, and hope Iran to be attacked to
make small countries out of Iran, will only get the wrath of Iranian people, and
will be marked for betrayal, even by Kurds and Azeris of Iran, just like those
who because of cooperation with Saddam Hussein, got the mark of treason by
Iranian people, and have been isolated from the Iranian movement. The Congress
of Nationalities for Federal Iran (iranfederal.org) and remnants of Komala and
PDKI better take their shop somewhere else and instead of getting money from
foreign countries, join the civil rights movement of Iran. Times of Comintern
and the foreign states making decisions for Iran has long passed and this is why
Iranian movement after so many years remembers Dr. Mossadegh with such
reverence. Don't do something to get the label of treason and betrayal of Iran
forever. If the mistake of Pishevari and Ghazi Mohammad in the era of dominance
of Stalinism in the international progressive movement, was understandable, the
actions of remnants of Komala, PDKI, and Congress of Nationalities for Federal
Iran (iranfederal.org) are not only unjustifiable but will be the mark of shame
on the forehead of their leaders.
Forces and individuals belonging to the prodemocracy movement of Iran that are
not agents of foreign powers should separate their way from these groups and
should clearly state that they are after democratization of Iran. Using the
models of provincial federalism in existing country of Iran is not for breaking
up Iran, but is to grow democracy in Iran, and that is all. Even if this model
of provincial federalism becomes something for separatists to misuse, I
personally am ready to remove federalism from my suggested political platform
altogether, instead of allowing it to give rise to a civil war in Iran. The
leaders of these ethnicists have heard all these several times but again they
translate federalism to ethnic federalism. I do not want to have any part in
such federalism and if that is what they are looking for, one should vote
negative to any proposal for federalism in any founding parliament in any future
state for Iran. I personally and specifically until these groups have not been
dissolved, or until the majority of supporters of federalism have not distanced
themselves from ethnic federalism, will not support the position of federal
republic for Iran. Repeating again, the issue for Iran, is not country-making
(nation-making), to allow the merging of the four provinces of Kurdistan to
create a new Kurdistan, so that it can become part of the Greater Kurdistan
schemes of PKK later (6). No we will resist any such schemes that are the start
of Iran's breakup.
Such ethnicist views were followed by some people for Azerbaijan, and a
generation was destroyed. This is a wrong road, let's not try it again. The
problem is not whether it is practical or not, the problem is that it is a wrong
way for any force in Iran's democratic movement, which wastes the movement's
energy on ethnic hatred, rather than on the growth of democracy. PJAK party is a
living example of this error in Turkey, and Iran does not even have the problems
of Turkey, when the Iran's branch of PKK, the PJAK, or Komala or PDKI, or
Congress of Nationalities for Federal Iran (iranfederal.org) are prescribing
such paths of going astray for our people. Theseactions have nothing to do with
the freedom movement of Iran and will only destroy the new secular and
democratic movement of Iran.
Hoping for a democratic and secular futurist republic in Iran,
http://www.ghandchi.com/index2.html
August 14, 2009
Footnotes:
1. مدینه فاضله قومی-ویرایش دوم
http://www.ghandchi.com/543-MadinehFazeleh.htm
2. ترکیه نشان داد مسأله 28 مرداد نیست!
http://www.ghandchi.com/480-28mordad.htm
3. فدرالیسم استانی و روند دموکراتیزه کردن ساختار قدرت
http://www.ghandchi.com/535-FederalismeOstani.htm
4. راه حل مسأله ملی در ایران
http://www.ghandchi.com/495-HaleMasalehMeli.htm
5.
Kurds and Formation of Central Government in Iran-Second Edition
http://www.ghandchi.com/700-KurdsIranEng.htm
کتاب کردها و شکل گیری دولت مرکزی در ایران-ویرایش دوم
http://www.ghandchi.com/700-KurdsIran.htm
6. نوشداروی کردستان بزرگ
http://www.ghandchi.com/478-GreaterKurdistanPanacea.htm
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http://www.ghandchi.com/723-kurdistan-autonomy-eng.htm
یادداشتی درباره طرح بحث انگیز خودمختاری کردستان
http://www.ghandchi.com/723-kurdistan-autonomy.htm
آيا فدراليسم اجازه سلب حقوق انساني را به ايالات ميدهد؟ -ويرايش دوم
http://www.ghandchi.com/362-FederalismRights.htm
چرا تجزیه طلبی را محکوم باید کرد -ویرایش دوم
http://www.ghandchi.com/696-Separatists.htm
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