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Tag: Iraq

IRAQI’S NEED ANOTHER SADDAM

“Hide that camera will you..” Samir screams. “I told you my area is full of insurgents, they will kill us both. These bastards are destroying everything now. They should kill them all.” I pull the camera down, we continue driving to Samir’s, listening to Mozart on the stereo, the baking heat making us both drip with sweat. Samir’s air conditioner in the car is broken, he doesn’t have enough money to buy a new radiator, he lost all his piano students after the war a year ago. It is not safe to travel anymore, and the roads here are gridlocked since the American’s closed so many main streets.

“You know I wish you could have seen me a few years ago. I was never like this. I had $200,000 in the bank before the 1991 war, then the sanctions came and the money was devalued, and so was all our lives. We were a first world nation reduced to a third world country. Can you imagine that? all the luxuries you like having in Britain suddenly being taken away from you overnight’.

We pass an American patrol. “But I blame Saddam for everything, he gave the American’s the excuse to be here now. He stole 30 years from every Iraqi’s life’. There is a road block, now guarded by Americans and Iraqi soldiers. this is new Iraq.

So why are the insurgents still fighting then? I ask him. Samir believes they are Saddam loyalists and foreign fighters. But many tell me they are ordinary Iraqi’s fighting to liberate their land from the American occupation. We reach Samir’s home, I quickly disappear inside the house, keeping a low profile. The house is hot, the electricity is not working and the generator is not strong enough to power the air coolers. Then the electricity comes on and the air coolers work.

We watch an interview with an Iraqi minister from the new interim government, defiant words on tackling the insurgents. “We will deal with them in our own way, in a way only the Iraqi people know” he smiles, and so does Samir. His words send a shiver down my spine. I see Ariel Sharon appear momentarily in his face. Samir gets agitated, “Iraqi’s need another Saddam, they need a dictator here. There are too many little Saddam’s out there to control.”

Then the electricity goes out again. Samir is angry. “They’ve had a year to get this right… Saddam sorted this out in 3 months after the war in 1991 and look at the place…” he goes off into another rant. I looked out of his window at the war torn neighbourhood, riddled with bullet holes, a US tank lies on a roadside destroyed.

Samir puts his arm around me. “Saddam knew how to run this country. He knew how to deal with his people.”

Small World

Sean McAllister and Samir Peter covered in mud
Sean McAllister and Samir Peter from The Liberace Of Baghdad enjoy some mud
Floating on the Dead Sea looking out to the promised land, it was quiet, peaceful, like biblical times. Then Samir got water in his eye, it burned. We were both covered in black mud, I had to guide him to the shower over the hot burning sands. For a moment I was Jesus and he was the blind man, then I heard him scream. I wasn’t looking and he hit his head against a pole, stuck out there in the sand.

Back home in Amman, a friend of Samir’s calls round. An out of work saxophone player who left Iraq 10 years ago after his house was taken from him by Saddam’s men. He is depressed so we drink some beer, then we end up here in the Sheraton where I write now. We watch the musicians play and then the singer comes over smiling at Samir “Are you Mr Peter?” “yes” Samir answers, he holds a card out, “Do you know this man?” we look at the card, it is Robert’s card. The billionaire mystery from a couple of weeks back.

Robert had promised to ship Samir’s grand piano to America, but we never heard from him again. He was an enigma, we explained to the singer that Robert had made Samir play the piano down his mobile phone to friends in America. He told us they were important White House people, then the singer smiles at us, “He told me to do the same.” Samir looks embarrassed. Well it is a small world.

Saddam and all the small talk

I missed my Samir today. I was sat in front of my telly in the hotel room thinking about Saddam’s appearance in court. I was tired. I’d been poolside last night with one bottle too many of red wine talking sex with French journalists listening to the odd explosion outside our walled compound.

I needed to sleep-in but a Sudanese friend called early and woke me. He seemed distraught. He told me that his cousin, a Sudanese with an American passport had been kidnapped last week. He was responsible for trying to find money to take to one of the many ‘kidnap offices’ on Karada. A big industry in lawless Iraq. They passed the money and were told that their cousin would be waiting at home. But two days later they still heard nothing, until news came that his dead body had been found in the street. Abdullah looked at me with sad eyes. He came to Iraq 15 years ago fleeing a civil war in his own country, but all he has ever seen here is war and hardship. “still better then home” he insists. “you know Iraq has never been more unsafe, they respect chickens more then humans now. You know you can be killed for as little as $15 – I know a cafe where you can hire people to kill. More important people are little more expensive maybe $50.”

Abdullah left and I went back to bed, fell into a deep sleep and missed Samir who I was supposed to meet around the pool. So there I was sat waiting for Saddam’s courtroom appearance on my own. I suddenly thought to film it, with Samir and his family, but I was a little nervous. Yesterday I’d put my foot in it with Saha and I was worried she may be angry with me still. I’d pushed her too much asking probing ‘Paxman’ like questions about her mother and Samir. I left her in tears. I felt terrible.

But I went anyway and Saha was out. Samir was with his brother. Neither seemed bothered about Saddam’s tv appearance until I pushed them. I wanted to film them, especially ‘Saddam loyalist Saha’ but she was out. Finally the pictures came through and it was electric. Samir and his brother watching avidly. Even Fadi, the wayward son, pulled himself away from his porn sites on the internet to come see.

Samir got angry. “This man should not be speaking. He will stir the people up again. He knows how to get to them. They should kill him now and have done.” Then Saha and Rita arrive home. They rush into the room. Saha is unrepentant about her views. “He should not be tried. He is still the President. Iraqi people love this man.” WHAT? I’m shocked and look to Rita to make sense of this. After 2 years living in America, maybe she can shed light on this. She looks at me.. “you know Sean, we all love this man. Me too.” Samir leaves the room. He has heard it all before.

Later, driving back to the hotel, he tells me that his children do not love Saddam in the way I think. He remembers first seeing Saddam being paraded on tv with his long beard, being manhandled by a dentist. “You know I hate the man passionately but when I saw this it made me so depressed. He was our President, our leader for years. Imagine if Britain was invaded and they took the Queen and did this her and showed her on television, imagine how the British people would feel. My children are like all Iraqi people, they are proud and they feel wounded by what has happened. It doesn’t mean they want to defend Saddam .. but he was our President Sean for 25 years.”

We pull up to the checkpoint that leads into our hotel. 5 young guards all with Kalashnikovs open the car to search it. Security has been increased since the recent suicide bomb attack on the hotel complex. I smile at a burly looking guard and attempt small talk. “You see Saddam on tv?” he looks at me sternly and smiles and holds his thumb up to me. “Saddam .. a very good man.” I look at the guard next to him. He is smiling too. “Saddam.. a good man.” We drive through leaving the guards clutching their guns. I look at Samir, thinking about our pro-Saddamist guards and how easy it would be for them to switch loyalty, or be providing information about who and where people are staying in the hotel. But Samir is angry, “what did I tell you… stop talking Saddam with people will you. These are tense times.”

Newly liberated Iraq is certainly no place for small talk.

Phone calls and arguments

Set out today with hope for filming the court room appearance of Saddam Hussein which takes place in Iraq tomorrow. Finally the project I originally came here to set up in January 2004 looks set to happen; A behind the scenes documentary of the trial of Saddam Hussein. At the same time I am filming the final installment of my film about ‘the pianist’ Samir Peter who hopes to follow his dream and live in The States.

Today was fraught with phone calls trying to get through to my contact, the President of the Iraqi Tribunal who has approved the documentary. Finally I get through to him, he tells me he is unsure whether he can get me into the court room tomorrow where Saddam will appear in front of a judge, shackled in chains. We hear that only 4 journalists will be allowed in. I’m told to call back at 4 this afternoon but as normal the Presidents phone is constantly engaged. I keep trying as I write this now anxious as what happens tomorrow would make a great opening for the film.

Amidst agonised attempts at calling the President I have been filming ‘the pianist’ at his home. His daughter has been visiting from The States but is now preparing to return home. Samir is waiting for his papers to come through after being given a Green Card.

It is an agonising wait for him. He is torn about leaving his daughter and son here in Iraq but hopes to get them to The States one day soon. His anti-American daughter Saha, has always resisted, a proud Iraqi she wanted to stay here, but seeing her sister and hearing news of her mother also living in America has made her reconsider things. She seems willing to give The States a go. It is Samir’s dream to gather his family there after years of struggling in Iraq. “Things have to get worse here before they get better” he insists, and he is getting on in life now, he wants to spend his last few years in peace. He is also concerned for his 25 year old son Fadi, also a talented pianist, but who now refuses to play, not wanting to end up like his father playing in an empty hotel bar to earn money to get by. Fadi wants money, but in a country where the only work available is putting your life on the line as a policeman he prefers to stay at home, although he’d heard of a Safeway’s supermarket opening and hopes to work there.

The house was tense today. Fadi wasn’t talking with his father or his American sister. his sister had insulted him by insisting that he should not marry his Muslim girlfriend. He should find a Christian girl instead. It is a sore point, Samir doesn’t mention it much, but is does disturb him. As a Christian family they are a minority in Iraq and Fadi would have to convert to Islam to marry his girlfriend. In the end a good argument cleared the air and Samir slipped Fadi $20. Then I spoke with his daughter about her mother, and whether Samir would get back together with her when he goes to the states. I put my foot in it though, Samir hadn’t told the kids that they had separated…. and I did. The daughter left the scene in tears. I didn’t know what to say. I hope Samir can patch things up. Half of him hopes to get back with his wife but the other half knows that their love is dead.

Now I must get back on the phone to try see Saddam tomorrow.

Welcome to the new Iraq

Came back to Iraq to film my story with the ‘pianist’ at a historic moment – the hand over of power to the new Iraqi government. Journalists still take the expensive plane route into Iraq from Jordan as the road remains dangerous and kidnapping is still rife. After the familiar corkscrew landing into Baghdad International Airport, avoiding any surface to air missile attack, I headed into Baghdad. There was a much greater presence of Iraqi police, one standing proud with a shining new machine gun next to a police car riddled with bullet holes. An ominous sign. “It is quiet at the moment” my driver said, then looking at me out of the corner of his eye, “it is the calm before the storm”. The next round of attacks are never far away. Having lived in my secured hotel compound for 5 months on and off since January 2004 we had been on high alert for an attack. It never happened but as I arrived back after 6 weeks in England I realised it had and I had narrowly escaped it. 

I was just settling in my hotel when the Iraqis around me noticed the handover of power taking place in front of our eyes on the television. We broke from conversation momentarily acknowledging it and then continued talking about a suicide bomber who had tried to enter the heavily secured hotel compound where I stay a week after I’d returned to England. The bomber was prevented from entering and blew himself up on the street wrecking the front of another hotel building and killing many bystanders, including a 13 year old boy, who Samir (the subject of my film) used to buy his cigarettes from everyday. 

We went to buy bread, the bakery windows were smashed and the bakery boys were in bandages. The bomb blast had thrown them from one side of the bakery to the other. Then on our way back to the hotel we met the father of the 13 year old cigarette seller. His father, a man of my age, held the arm of his younger son tightly. I shook his hand, I didn’t know what to say. Some things are so desperate, so sad, that you cannot say anything. But then a few hours pass and I find myself not even thinking of the boy or the plight of his father, I am sat poolside at the hotel drinking a long cool beer with other journalists enjoying the luxuries that the air conditioned hotel provides in a country that still struggles to get electricity for half the day, where the temperatures rage to 55c. 

I notice the absence of the heavily armed mercenaries (ex army/sas soldiers employed on mass here to protect everyone from contractors to journalists, to the US army convoys) the pool looks more beautiful without them I note. The most notorious company were at our hotel, the ‘blackwater’ guys, famous after some of them were lynched and set on fire when caught in Fallujah. They all left, I am told, after another 4 were killed in an ambush in Baghdad. Around the same time another mercenary had killed himself in his room over-dosing while injecting drugs into his arm. We finish the beer and order more. 

“Welcome back to newly liberated Iraq” my friends tell me.