Today, Saturday, the convoy of Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kazemi was pelted with stones by a group of people who attended the funeral ceremonies of the poet Muzaffar Al-Nawab in Baghdad, and the demonstrators chanted slogans denouncing what they described as the corruption of the political class.
The poet’s body had arrived at Baghdad International Airport, and then was transferred to the Writers Union headquarters, where the funeral ceremony was held in an official and popular presence.
Today, Saturday, in Baghdad, the Iraqis bid farewell to the great Iraqi poet Muzaffar al-Nawab, with a solemn and popular funeral, reflecting the struggle history of the poet, who was known for his opposition to Arab regimes and his harsh criticism, while mourners denounced the participation of the Prime Minister.
The body of the poet, who died at the age of 88 in the UAE, was transferred by presidential plane to Baghdad International Airport, where official ceremonies were held for him in the presence of Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kazemi.
Then he was taken in an official procession to the headquarters of the Iraqi Writers Union, where hundreds of people of different generations, women and men, gathered to participate in the last farewell to the deputies.
On the outskirts of the road leading to the union, hundreds of people who wore the Iraqi flag gathered, expressing their grief over the loss of this Iraqi symbol.
The ceremony was shortened following some young people began chanting slogans once morest Al-Kazemi and once morest the authority, such as “You are all thieves”, “No, no to clients” and “Out, out”, in an atmosphere reminiscent of the anti-authority protests two years ago.
Al-Nawab, who was born in Baghdad on the first of January/In January 1934, he graduated from the Faculty of Arts at its university with his revolutionary poems following years in prison and exile. The author of the two poems, “Jerusalem, the bride of your Arabism” and “tops,” the stinging “tops” spent in the world of poetry. The first poem that he highlighted in the world of poetry was “A Reading in the Notebook of Rain” in 1969.
The deputies spent most of his life outside Baghdad, but he remained present in the conscience of the Iraqis who bid him farewell by circulating his pictures and poems on social media since the news of his death was announced.
Although he was from a previous generation, his poems spread widely during the popular protests in 2019, and were transmitted by young people as an expression of their rejection of political reality and their hope for change.
