Anbar people upset over lack of services

ANBAR / IraqiNews.com: Several citizens in al-Anbar are upset due to lack of services in their predominantly Sunni province, which adds to the troubles they face over a rampant unemployment among youths there. Mohammed Al-Aani, a civil servant, told IraqiNews.com news agency, that services are “deteriorating in Anbar to the point that some houses are floating on sewage water”. “Some neighborhoods get no power supply and others maintain their power networks by their private funding,” he said. “We hope that the new provincial council members would fulfill their campaign promises to rebuild the province,” he added. Mohammed Nasser, 25, said “chaos and lack of planning made al-Anbar go into a deep nap”. “If investment projects were exploited, a big change was supposed to occur in the province,” he explained. He hoped that the new elected provincial council would be “more serious and have more credibility to serve Al-Anbar.” Hussein Jabbar, a 50-year-old man who works in the private sector in Falluja city, is thinking of fleeing al-Anbar to another province. “Job opportunities are available in all the Iraqi provinces except al-Anbar, especially Falluja city (45 km west of Baghdad),” he said. “We work for a day and do not for many although the province needs services,” he proceeded. “Are the new members of a-Anbar council going to care about their province’s problems? We hope so, but we have doubts in this regard,” he noted. For his part, Mohammed Abdulhameed, an engineer of the al-Anbar municipality’s investment office, said, “We are in the final steps to finish the investment projects of 2008.” “There are plans in the near future to bring Arab and foreign investment projects to the province,” he pointed out. “We just call on the people of al-Anbar to observe patience,” he said. Concerning the concrete barricades in al-Anbar, Lt. Colonel Hatif Mohammed of the province’s police, said the current barricades are aimed at protecting people from the remnants of murder and terror gangs.” “The coming days will witness the removal of a large number of those barricades,” he said. “It is the time to start the rebuilding process in Al-Anbar; that is what the people here deserve,” he added. But Nawrass Ali, a 27-year-old resident of Ramadi city who has a degree in economics, does not trust the local officials’ ability to employ investments. “Al-Anbar is supposed to become a haven of investments,” he noted. Abdulhameed Abid Lateef, a journalist and resident of Falluja, agrees with Ali. “Services and housing projects in the province have been tripping due to conflicts between local officials,” Lateef explained. “The number of projects allocated to al-Anbar does not fit its weight as the largest province in Iraq,” he stressed. Ramadi, the capital city of al-Anbar province, lies 110 km west of Baghdad. MH (R)/AmR 3