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http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/13/international/worldspecial/13CIVI.html?th
Military Begins Screening Iraqis for New Rule By IAN FISHER
BAGHDAD, Iraq, April 12 ·The business of staffing a new Iraqi government began literally in front of American tanks today. Job-seekers showed up at a hotel here, in response to a radio announcement, and a translator near the tanks ordered the men into lines: police to the right, doctors to the left. Marines set up lines for electricians, engineers, sanitation workers.
"We need new police, honest police!" shouted Magdad al-Jaburi, 45, who was seeking to reclaim the job as a police captain he said he lost 10 years ago. "A new government, a democratic government!"
Finding a new top leadership for Iraq is important, no doubt, but right now there is no one to put out the fires, stop the looters, tend to all the sick and wounded or even pick up the trash piling up on the streets of this smoldering city of five million people.
The war is not over, but the residents of Baghdad are already craving everyday order ·something, they say with flashes of anger, the few American marines here just cannot provide.
"Now we are satisfied that Saddam Hussein has left," said Firas Ibrahim, 30. "But if this situation keeps up, we will all become volunteer fedayeen," referring to Mr. Hussein's most loyal militia.
"This situation," he said, "is too much to bear."
Mr. Ibrahim was standing in front of the Ministry of Trade in downtown Baghdad, where Mr. Hussein's government handed out the food rations that at least 60 percent of Iraqis ·including Mr. Ibrahim ·depended on. Other ministries provided cheap gasoline, refrigerators, clothing and employment for, by one estimate, a third of Iraqis.
Today, flames poured from the Ministry of Trade's windows, just one of dozens of government buildings destroyed since the fighting came to Baghdad. Looters, some of them children, hauled out everything of value. Some young people found ammunition inside, a discovery not likely to increase the prospects for order here. "Around the world, are people satisfied with this riot?" asked Hassan Adil, 37, a tailor standing under the billows of smoke. "We need electricity, water, protection from soldiers ·everything."
Col. John Pomfret, who supervises the supply of ammunition and fuel to some 22,000 marines, said today that the military's immediate goal was restoring the city's utilities and civil order.
"We want to bring back a sense of normalcy here," he said.
Colonel Pomfret said the military was trying to hire Iraqi police officers as quickly as possible, and had begun interviewing and screening applicants for any association with Mr. Hussein's government. But he said most rank-and-file police officers would probably be accepted.
"We've talked to the local leaders," Colonel Pomfret said in an interview. "The average police officer was O.K. It was the leadership that was corrupt."
He added that American military engineers were also moving to restore electricity and water to the city, noting that many electrical grids and pumping stations had been vandalized and were in urgent need of repair.
The colonel said the goal was to have the Iraqis lead the way in rebuilding the city, with the Americans providing expertise and materials.
"There is a vacuum right now," he added. "We don't want to be the established government. We don't want to decide. We want to enable. We want to support. There has to be a level of self-determination."
Speaking of Iraqi engineers and professionals, Colonel Pomfret said: "We don't want to replace these people; we want to find them. If we take over the hospitals and the electrical grids, then we are running them, not the Iraqis. That's not what we want."
In the meantime, the colonel said, his engineers were busy purifying water and would soon begin distributing it around various parts of the city.
"Food is not a problem," he said. "People need pure water, and they need electricity."
As Iraq waits for water, electricity and a new government, some residents have begun policing their own neighborhoods. In the Adhamiya district, civilian police officers walked the streets with clubs and chained dogs. At Al Kindi hospital and the Saddam Pediatric Hospitals, neighbors and other volunteers have begun to provide armed protection against looters.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/13/international/worldspecial/13CIVI.html?th