Today, Tuesday, we visited Parliament for a presentation by Sufian Elhassan, Director, Research and Information. Jordan’s legislative procedures - a bicameral National Assembly, appointed Senate and an 110 member Chamber of Deputies elected by universal suffrage to a 4-year term - are embedded in the 1952 Constitution which follows the Belgium model. Elhassan gave us an historical overview in order place the development of the Kingdom’s parliamentary process in context.
Jordan’s creation as a “buffer state” between Israel and Iraq, its west bank Jordan River lands, and the conflicts marking that geopolitical reality, disrupted the 4 year election cycle. After the 1967 war, how were Palestinian Jordanians living under occupation to vote? The increasing strength of the PLO further threatened the state, and in 1974 the Arab Conference meeting in Morocco demanded that Jordan surrender authority of Palestine to the PLO as the “only legitimate Palestinian representative.” Only after Jordan’s final severance with the West Bank in 1988, Elhassan explains, did elections to restore Parliament occur. The most recent 2007 election, Elhassan notes, elected the first women outside the 6 member quota reserved for women. Elhassan took questions and concluded with a brief discussion of current United States – Jordanian relations (King Abdullah & Queen Rania’s April visit to the United States, President Obama’s Cairo address, the US Congress increased appropriations for Jordan, the occasion of the Ambassador’s 4th of July reception), remarking that Jordan has a “love affair” with the United States and wishes that love to be returned.
Wednesday we will have time to work on our curriculum projects, returning to the classroom and a tour of the King Abdullah Mosque on Thursday. Stay “tuned.”
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