AMMAN, Jordan, May 21 (UPI) -- The winds of change that drifted through the small Arab emirate of Kuwait in the past few weeks shifted Sunday when the emir dissolved Parliament and called for fresh elections next month.
Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah said in a televised address he decided to dissolve the 50-seat National Assembly after differences between opposition lawmakers and the government over a controversial draft elections law could not be resolved through dialogue in Parliament.
He said his decision came to stop the dispute from spreading into the streets, warning this was threatening the country's national unity and security.
While the Kuwaiti ruler's decision was within his constitutional rights, dissolving Parliament and calling for fresh polls on June 29 without resolving the dispute over the elections bill is a setback for the reformists who were gaining support in the street.
In the past week, there were images of young men and women, dressed in orange t-shirts and chanting slogans from Parliament's gallery and outside, demanding reforms and greater democracy.
There were no police forces trying to disperse the crowd, no tear gas canisters being fired, no scenes of protesters being handcuffed and shoved into police vans.
These images alone were the envy of other Arab masses closely watching the unfolding of events as they hoped the winds of change blowing through Kuwait will send a breeze to the rest of the region that needs it.
While the emir's decree came to end the political crisis, dissolving Parliament has put an end to the democratic exercise, at least temporarily.
Its dissolution came as opposition lawmakers were seeking to cross-examine Prime Minister Sheikh Nasser al-Sabah, a member of the ruling family, on the disputed elections bill that has caused an uproar in the country.
Opposition legislators, describing themselves as reformers which include Islamists and liberals, last week staged a dramatic walk-out from Parliament to the cheers of crowds in the gallery as the government decided to refer the draft bill to the constitutional court to assess its legality.
The draft law reduced the number of constituencies from 25 to 10, but the opposition has been demanding five constituencies to fight vote buying and violations they complain had been widespread during the last general elections in 2003.
The opposition lawmakers argued that taking the draft bill to the court was a government attempt, backed by conservative MPs, to stall reforms since court proceedings can take months or years.
With the backing of hundreds of protesters who had made a habit of gathering outside the parliament building throughout the week to voice their dissent, 29 opposition lawmakers threatened to use their prerogative to grill the prime minister and stop cooperating with the government.
Since parliament has no constitutional powers to vote out the Cabinet or prime minister, its non-cooperation with the government leaves the next step to the emir, who could have also dismissed the prime minister and formed a new Cabinet if he chose.
The reformist MPs were waiting for Monday's session to use their right to grill the prime minister, for the first time in Kuwait's parliamentary history, as leverage to reduce the voting districts.
Opposition lawmakers have said they would withdraw their request to question the prime minister if the government agreed to downsize the number of constituencies to five instead of ten.
But their threats seemed to have backfired with the emir's decree to dissolve the National Assembly altogether, in which they lost their battle on the draft law and will now need to seek re-election according to the current law of 25 districts, rendering their efforts useless.
Parliament's dissolution saved the prime minister from being caught in a tight spot where he needed to choose between being cross-examined or submitting to reformers' demands of slashing the voting districts to five.
If he chose to submits to the opposition, he would have been accused by a large conservative and tribal minority of weakness and abandoning the rights of communities that could as easily take to the streets as those wearing orange.
Government officials were privately quoted in Kuwaiti newspapers as saying if five constituencies were approved, it would not have been fair to the Shiites, estimated at around 30 percent of the 1.1 million citizens, and to those living in remote areas.
Kuwait's Arab Times quoted an unidentified official as saying if the government approved five districts, it could anger "citizens living in remote areas and Shiites, who may also stage demonstrations to express their disapproval."
The official acknowledged the government was "fully aware the demonstrations organized by certain groups wearing orange will open the doors for other groups to hold similar sit-ins wearing different colors."
It appears the ruler of Kuwait was not ready to take that chance, as he made clear in his speech, and took the road often traveled by Arab regimes.
