Posted on 06/27/2002 6:12:18 AM PDT by JohnHuang2
ERUSALEM, June 26 — Yasir Arafat's Palestinian Authority officially announced plans today to hold elections for president and legislative offices in January as part of a broad proposal for civic and security reform that stopped short of President Bush's demand for Mr. Arafat's replacement.
One Palestinian minister said that Mr. Arafat planned to run again, while others said it was too early to predict who the presidential candidates might be. Mr. Arafat's Palestinian critics said they were confident that their long-serving leader would not be stepping aside voluntarily.
Hussam Khader, a Palestinian legislator and one of the most passionate critics of Mr. Arafat within his Fatah movement, said that Mr. Bush's comments had guaranteed that Mr. Arafat would stay in power for years to come.
Paraphrasing Mr. Bush, he went on: "When he said `I don't want Yasir Arafat, and I want a new leadership,' then he emotionally pushed the Palestinian people to re-elect Yasir Arafat. This is the worst thing he mentioned in his speech. This will give new life to Yasir Arafat and his corrupt people."
In a sign of how difficult Mr. Bush's vision of a mature Palestinian democracy may be to achieve, Mr. Khader said that he did not plan to run for re-election himself, having given up on the possibility that the Legislature could be a meaningful, independent voice. He added that after Mr. Bush's speech even he was now reluctant to call for Mr. Arafat's replacement.
Mr. Arafat "will run, sure he will run," Mr. Khader said. "No one will beat him. Yasir Arafat, he's still the symbol."
Palestinian officials warned that they would not be able to conduct elections until Israeli forces withdraw from the West Bank towns they have occupied and take up the positions they held in September 2000, before the latest conflict began. In his speech, Mr. Bush suggested that Israel withdraw, but only after violence subsides.
In a further complication, Palestinian officials said that they expected Palestinians living in Jerusalem to vote in the elections, as they did in 1996. But Prime Minister Ariel Sharon calls Jerusalem Israel's eternal, undivided capital, and might resist such an expression of alternative sovereignty.
In his speech Monday, Mr. Bush called for free elections and, without mentioning Mr. Arafat by name, demanded new Palestinian leadership "not compromised by terror."
American officials said that before calling for Mr. Arafat's removal Mr. Bush received intelligence showing that the Palestinian leader had helped finance a group, the Aksa Martyrs Brigades, that is behind suicide bombings that have killed Israelis as recently as last week. Israeli officials said that they had recently shown such intelligence to the White House.
Aides to Mr. Arafat dismissed the accusation as Israeli propaganda.
Mr. Arafat was overwhelmingly elected in 1996, in the only previous presidential election in the Palestinian Authority. The Palestinian Authority was created by the Oslo accords to provide limited self-government to Palestinians in parts of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the lands Israel occupied in 1967.
Meeting with reporters today in Jericho, Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, said, "President Arafat officially declared today that the election of the president of the Palestinian Authority and the election of the Palestinian Legislative Council will be held in January 2003."
Jericho is the only one of eight major Palestinian cities and towns in the West Bank that has not been re-taken by Israeli ground forces and placed under curfew. Israel announced a new policy of seizing territory under the control of the Palestinian Authority according to Oslo after two suicide bombings last week killed 26 Israelis. Israel says it will hold the territory until the attacks cease.
Nabil Shaath, the Palestinian planning minister, said that Mr. Arafat had told him he planned to run for president. But Yasir Abed Rabbo, the minister of information and culture, said that it was premature to talk about who might run.
Citing the growing popularity of the militant Islamic group Hamas, Mr. Shaath said that Hamas "might even take over a majority of the Parliament."
But Hamas leaders, strict opponents of Oslo, have said they would not participate in elections that are tied to the accords, which were negotiated almost 10 years ago and are now all but without force.
The "100 Days Plan" of reform released today, which confirmed details reported previously, was drawn up by a committee of ministers appointed by Mr. Arafat. It was forwarded to Washington and Arab capitals on Monday, in anticipation that Mr. Bush would call for thorough changes in Palestinian governance.
The plan calls for sharp separation of powers, new consolidation and discipline of the multiple security agencies and school curricula renouncing fanaticism and emphasizing democratic values.
In particular, all tax revenue and other income to the Palestinian Authority would be deposited in one treasury account; official commercial and investment operations are to be run by a single "Palestinian Investment Fund" with strict, independent auditing.
The plan also requests new regulations spelling out the duties of Palestinian governors, who are appointed by Mr. Arafat and sometimes clash with local officials. The governors will now report to the minister of interior — who, under the proposed reforms, would be a powerful official overseeing internal security in the West Bank and Gaza, a senior Palestinian official said.
In a sign of the basic level at which Palestinians are seeking to rationalize their governance, the plan commits the Palestinian Authority to "put into force all laws that have been passed."
Palestinian officials have repeatedly said that Israeli blockades and military attacks have crippled their institutions; for example, many legislators, like Mr. Khader, are unable to travel from their home cities to Ramallah to meet.
But Mr. Arafat has also ignored the Legislature when it suited him. Only last month did he sign a so-called Basic Law, a sort of constitution guaranteeing basic rights to Palestinians, that the Legislature passed five years ago. It is still not known for certain what version of the law he signed, but today's plan declares that "the Basic Law will be published in the Official Gazette no later than" July 15.
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