Al-Jalihawi was one of the prominent activists in the popular Tishreen movement, which began in late 2019. At the beginning of the Tishreen demonstrations, the news of her admission to the Romanian University of Bucharest reached her, and after two months, with the protests fading, she traveled to Romania, to complete the registration procedures, and then months later switched her studies to the system of studying for students. After, she returns to continue her march with her comrades in the protests inside Iraq, as Nour tells the “Sky News Arabia” website“.
Nour tells about her story and her ambition to get from the demonstration fields and protest squares to Parliament, saying: “After I obtained my university degree in history, and like other Iraqi youth, I did not find an opportunity to work in the public sector, which prompted me to go to the private sector, but my desire to Providing humanitarian service, prompted me to work within civil society organizations“.
Nour adds: “Because women are the most marginalized element in Iraqi society, I started defending their rights through women’s and human rights organizations, and this did not prevent me from completing my ambition for academic achievement and gradation, and in 2020 I obtained a master’s degree from the University of Bucharest in Romania.“.
The young candidate explains how her human rights awareness and political orientations crystallized, and her quest for change in her country and in the reality of people’s lives in Iraq, saying: “Because friction with the layers of society makes you more aware of people’s conditions, and because we live in the same reality, a state of protest against the Iraqi reality and the parties in power has generated in me. which caused great and profound havoc in the country.”
And she added, “In light of this miserable situation, the outbreak of the October protests represented a major turning point, as we were actively participating in them within the Diwaniyah governorate, located 180 km from the capital Baghdad, and we and our comrades were threatened, and among us there were victims as a result of repression and terrorism between One dead and one wounded, which prompted us to think about taking rights, and conveying Tishreen’s demands and the protest voice, through the parliamentary struggle, by running for parliamentary elections within the first constituency in Diwaniyah governorate, within the framework of the Tishreen extension movement, despite being threatened and intimidated, to leave the candidacy“.
The Iraqi candidate added: “Amid the lack of financial support in our electoral propaganda, we did not spend money as the parties spent on their candidates, but rather relied on youth awareness and education, and our program was that we would be the voice of protest in the parliament, and the supportive voice for Iraqi women in parliament.“.
Nour continues: “After closing the boxes and after announcing the results at the polling stations, it was found that we won by 6.5 thousand votes, a big difference from the nearest competition by two thousand votes, which made me the first in the province in terms of women candidates, but I was surprised by the announcement of different results, without counting two thousand. Vote in my favour, increase it and calculate it for my competition, and according to the initial announcement of the Electoral Commission, my competition advanced by 120 votes over me, although the evidence and evidence in our possession indicates that it did not achieve half of the declared votes.– According to Nour.
Nour concluded her speech by saying: “This is how we took the legal path and submitted an appeal, and we will not remain silent about confiscating the will of the citizen and confiscating the votes of the Tishreen youth and their representatives, for the benefit of the parties in power..“
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