No one could have imagined a quarter of a century ago that Iraq would become a breeding ground for corruption unprecedented in history. It is no exaggeration to say that the corrupt environment in which Iraq now operates could shock even the most seasoned architects of corruption.

The normalization of corruption has exceeded all prior expectations. Throughout history, all states have known corruption in varying forms and degrees. But for an entire state to be corrupt, its employees reduced to mere cogs in a vast machine of corruption, is something that has occurred nowhere except in Iraq.

Iraq, whose social fabric was legally torn apart when its people were transformed by the new constitution into “components,” is a country whose state is weaker than the parties and militias that seized control of its political life - not to manage the daily affairs of its people, but to loot its wealth. For their religious authorities, this wealth has no owner, or is said to belong to the “Hidden Imam,” which in turn legitimizes its seizure by the supposed descendants of that Imam. This, of course, constitutes a formal declaration of the legal appropriation of Iraq’s oil revenues. What has not been officially declared, however, is that Iraqi oil has been stolen and smuggled by Shiite parties for the past twenty years without a single one being held accountable. The Fadhila Party, also known as the Virtue Party, is an Iraqi Shiite Islamist party, for example, takes its share of Basra’s oil without participating in Baghdad’s governments or its parliament.

The facade of perpetual victimhood
But what about the federal system in Iraq led by Shiite parties? It is not true that the Kurdish administration in northern Iraq follows Baghdad’s sovereign decisions. Nor is it true that the Peshmerga, the Kurdish militia, takes orders from the commander-in-chief of the armed forces. Likewise, the (Sunni) parties that have been politically packaged by Iran are now free to use foreign funding to entrench their independent influence in western regions. In reality, Iraq is a state that does not exercise sovereignty over its own territory, meaning it is, in effect, a postponed partition project.

Within this fractured reality, Shiite party leaders constantly warn of the possibility of a Baathist return to power aimed at ending Shiite majority rule, implying that Shiites actually govern Iraq. This contradicts reality. Members of the sect who have been misled and manipulated have been ideologically mobilized in a way that serves the agendas of parties and militias which, through accumulated financial corruption, administrative chaos, and the absence of national conscience, have gradually turned into financial empires. These entities do not hesitate to shift political loyalties at any moment, while maintaining a margin of sectarian rhetoric to keep Shiites imprisoned by baseless fears.

If Nouri al-Maliki, driven by madness for absolute power, was the first to call for ending the sectarian quota system to allow the largest sect a chance to rule, his followers, following his methodology, are today demanding Shiite governance. This could mark the darkest phase of modern Iraqi history, due to the organized plundering of wealth it would entail, with the state serving as its legal cover after armed factions have tightened their grip on all its gateways. Even the limited space for freedom of expression would disappear under a de facto state of emergency, reflected in the Supreme Court’s decision criminalizing any incitement against the political system - a ruling later withdrawn under direct US pressure.

Look to Iran
The Popular Mobilization Forces no longer need to declare their own state in Iraq; that state already exists in practice. Armed factions no longer need to raise their weapons against the government or threaten to expel foreign forces, since the state itself has become their property.

Additionally, Iran has allowed them to neutralize their (resistant) weapons against the American military presence, which Iranians believe can be tamed by deceiving them with a truce. It is in Iran's interest at this stage to keep Iraq away from direct conflict and its unpredictable manifestations. If it is required for Iraq to be an American protectorate, then so be it. What is important to Iran is that its factions in Iraq are not drawn into the trap that Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Lebanese Shiite armed group and political party, fell into, which was an erroneous Iranian arrangement.

As for what remains, any government belonging to the Coordination Framework Alliance will ensure the implementation of what preserves Iran's interests, especially concerning the flow of hard currency from Iraq.

In this way, Iran preserves the safety of its armed factions while safeguarding its interests through a reliably loyal government that monopolizes representation of Iraq’s largest demographic bloc. At the same time, it shows no concern for the harsh living conditions endured by that bloc, which Shiite governance parties now treat merely as a tool, used during elections and discarded afterward, after activating sectarian mechanisms that isolate it nationally and reinforce submission to endless funeral processions. These occasions have multiplied to the point that Iraqis now spend much of their lives commemorating religious events of a sectarian nature.

Even if Shiite governance is not formally declared in the near future, all the evidence emerging from the latest election results confirms that the Iranian option has triumphed, and that Iraq is entering one of the darkest periods in its history.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed by the writers are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Annahar