Kuwait s Parliamentary Revolution

Did you listen to the Parliamentary debate?

We've gone through three elections, presidential and parliamentary.

So once politicians reach the parliamentary environment they will behave accordingly.

We are essentially going to become the parliamentary body of France.

The consequences of this assertion of parliamentary authority will be enormous. Parliamentary ratification did not simply provide a rubber stamp to a palace coup its approval was conditional. Emirs who need parliamentary approval to secure popular legitimacy must now reckon with the need to share power.

I think it raises great things about parliamentary ideas, democracy, public space, being together, being individual.

Parliamentary activity has become a political tug of war between the ruling and opposition parties over the issue.

Kuwait has just held its eleventh parliamentary election since independence in 1961. Though Kuwait is a monarchy, its parliamentary history has not been placid, and the election campaign reflected ongoing tensions between the royal family and segments of the electorate.

The Anglo Saxon genius for parliamentary government asserted itself there was a great deal of talk and no decisive action.

How can the scholar, who dwells away in the North West Territory or the Isle of Man, tell what is parliamentary in the kitchen?

And in Iraq, finally, violence is on the rise again, and the country has yet to form a government four months after its last parliamentary elections.

According to our Greek daily about half of Greece's cops voted for Golden Dawn, helping it capture a handful of parliamentary seats in the may 2012 election.

According to Kuwait s constitution, the new ruler has one year to appoint a crown prince, but he has to appoint a prime minister immediately. The delay is significant, because Kuwaitis are unaccustomed to this kind of parliamentary influence.

Many people on the left have put their hopes in a Syriza win, but with the narrow victory by New Democracy, the right wing party, and with Golden Dawn winning 18 parliamentary seats, the false illusion of Greek democracy was shathered once again

With independence in 1961, these rules were codified in a constitution. Compared to other Gulf monarchies, the Kuwaiti royal family has limited powers, though constitutional rules have frequently been ignored charges of vote rigging marred the 1967 election, and parliamentary dissolution has dotted the country s history.

In Afghanistan, it could have meant instead of concentrating on the big presidential and parliamentary elections, we should have done what was in the Afghan constitution from the very beginning, which is to get direct local elections going at a district level and elect people's provincial governors.

With this election, Kuwaiti women participated in choosing the parliament for the first time. Though women have long been active in Kuwaiti public life, they were enfranchised only last year, after a long and difficult campaign, by a parliamentary vote, and accounted for just 28 of the 249 candidates.

One remembers Hitler, who, while his own party did not quite get 50 of the vote, could base his seizure of power on a parliamentary majority. More recently, elections in the post communist countries of Europe have brought groups to power whose democratic credentials are dubious, to say the least.

In the Netherlands, the shock that arose over the killing of the film maker Theo van Gogh runs deep and has led to demands for legislation against hate speech. In Britain, proposed legislation concerning incitement to religious hatred and terrorism has led to emotional parliamentary debates and to doubts about the liberal credentials of Tony Blair s government.

Parliament retains the right to interrogate cabinet members, including the Prime Minister, on financial and administrative questions and has frequently passed motions of no confidence in government. More recently, with the death last December of the Emir, Sheikh Jabir al Ahmad, parliamentary approval was exercised a key role in resolving succession debates among factions of the royal family.

In exchange for voting to pass over the unfit Crown Prince, Kuwait s parliament is now demanding even more political and economic reforms, including the formal legalization of political parties, the separation of the position of prime minister from that of crown prince, and even for the prime minister to be chosen from outside the Al Sabah family. This was a true parliamentary revolution.