The assembly of the conference
After the second conference’s recommendations’ were fulfilled by the party’s temporary central committee about the program, interior procedure, and the condition that happened to the KDP due to the separation of Hamza Abdullah’s wing, the KDP’s central committee hastened to assemble the third conference.
Note: KDP or PDK (Kurdistan Democratic Party)
After the full preparation, on January 26th, 1953, the KDP’s third conference assembled secretly at the house of colonel Fatih Jabbari, Shaterloo neighborhood, Kirkuk with the presence of 35 to 40 representatives from the party’s organizations, and the former and new leadership of the party, in a volatile security condition.
After reading the report of the convention and its acceptance by the attendees, it was time to change the party’s name and configure the interior procedures and program. As a result, the party’s name changed from the “Kurdish Democratic Party” to the “Kurdistan Democratic Party-Iraq,” and a plan was drawn to alter the party’s procedure and program, but it was postponed to the post-selection of the party’s central committee. Therefore, the new members of the central-committee elected by the conference members were:
- Mustafa Barzani, the President
- Ibrahim Ahmad, Secretary General
- Dr. Jafaar Mohammad Kareem
- Mirhaaj Ahmad Akrayi
- Nuri Shaways
- Ali Abdullah
- Nuri Ahmad Taha
- Jalal Talabani
- Omar Mustafa
- Ali Hamdi Beduhee
- Rashid Abdulkadir
- Mohammed Amin Maroof
- Jaleel Hoshiyar
Later, four members were appointed to the political bureau as follows:
Ibrahim Ahmad, Nuri Shaways, Ali Abdullah, and Omar Mustafa
In this conference, the president’s name will be stated contextually, as it was stated in Article 29 of the Interior Procedure: “President of Kurdistan Democratic Party-Iraq, Hero of Kurdistan’s Liberation General Mustafa Barzani, president of Kurdistan Democratic Party-Iraq,” and for the first time the term “secretary general” was used in the history of the KDP.
The most important decisions of the conference were:
- Changing KDP’s name from “Kurdish Democratic Party” to “Kurdistan Democratic Party-Iraq”
- Lenin’s Marxism was selected as the party’s ideology.
- Prty’s organ name changed from (“Rizgary”: liberation) to (“Khabat”: endeavor).
- Establishment of the Kurdistan Student Union, the Kurdistan Democratic Youth Union, and the Kurdistan Women Union organizations
- Permanent dismissal of Hamza Abdullah from the party’s ranks.
- Not receiving Awni Yousif as the representative of the conference under the allegation of not abiding by the leadership’s decisions during the second conference.
The structure of the Kurdistan Democratic Party-Iraq, based on the interior procedure of the third conference, is organized as follows: cells (Shana), district (Nawcha) committee, branch (Liq) committee, central committee, political bureau, party’s secretary-general, and the president.
Holding Marxism-Leninism ideologies, as it was not compatible with national and party ideologies and was against the will of the majority of the party’s cadres and members. It seems that despite the pertaining ideology of that era, the reason for this was competing with the Communist Party, which led to many of the communist and Marxist belief holders in Kurdistan contacting the KDP.
Regarding KDP’s media and publishing after the third conference, despite the “Rizgari” newspaper, whose name changed to “Khabat” and was the party’s organ, the “Nidaa Kurdistan” newspaper was printed in the Arabic language, and two other publications entitled “Regay New,” specific to intellectuals and youth, and “Prkay Jutiyar,” specific to farmers, were published in the Kurdish language.
References
- Jalal Talabani’s letter (Pirot) to the Commander General Mustafa Barzani and his beloved friend Mirhaj Ahmad, (5-10-1955, Beijing), Masoud Barzani, Barzani and The Kurdish Liberation Movement, 1931-1958, First Volume, (Erbil, Ministry of Education Press, 2004), Document number 7.
- Habeeb Mohammed Kareem, The History of the Kurdistani Democratic Party, Iraq (In the main stages) 1946-1993, (Duhok, Khabat Press, 1998)
- Ali Abdullah, The History of the Kurdistani Democratic Party-Iraq to the Assembly of its Third Conference, (place: Unknown, 1968)
- Kurdistan Democratic Party’s third conference’s procedure text
