ARBIL, May 7: Kurdish lawmakers on Sunday voted for a single administration to run their autonomous region of Kurdistan in northern Iraq, ending the previous system of two separate local governments.

“We now have one government for Kurdistan,” said Adnan Mufti, the speaker of the Kurdish parliament after the 111 parliamentarians voted unanimously in favour of one administration.

Until now, Iraqi President Jalal Talabani’s Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) was solely responsible for running Sulaimaniyah province, and Kurdish regional president Massoud Barzani’s Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) was running Arbil and Dohuk.

With Sunday’s unanimous voting, the two administrations were merged into one single administration and a new cabinet must now be formed.

Mufti said the new cabinet will have 27 ministers, with PUK and KDP each having 11 ministers and the rest representing other smaller parties.

A host of Iraqi leaders and international officials led by US ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad were present for the voting session of the Kurdish parliament on Sunday.

“I pay homage to the sacrifices made by the Kurdish people, the Iraqi people and the peshmerga to create a free state in Iraq following the fall of Saddam Hussein’s dictatorial regime,” Khalilzad said.

Iraq’s Vice-President Adel Abdel Mahdi called it a “historic day, when Kurdistan gives us an example of unity and prosperity.

“To those who are afraid of a strong Kurdistan, I respond that if Kurdistan is strong, Iraq is strong. If Kurdistan is united, Iraq is united,” he said.

It was still not clear whether the peshmerga forces of the two administrations were to be merged or not, but the key ministries of finance, interior and justice were to be unified.—AFP