Gorran party elects new leader following Nawshirwan Mustafa's death

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region (Kurdistan 24) – The Gorran (Change) party on Tuesday elected Omar Sayid Ali as the head of the party following the death of former leader Nawshirwan Mustafa.

In a unanimous vote, Gorran party members elected Ali with 38 votes from Gorran Council members.

During a speech after being elected, Ali vowed he would follow the principles of his party and the doctrine of the late Gorran leader Mustafa.

Ali was born in Sulaimani Province in 1945 and become a Peshmerga in 1974.

In 1976, he was sentenced to jail for six years by the Iraqi government but, after three years in prison, he was freed due to amnesty.

In 1992, he served as a member of parliament in the Kurdistan Region for the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK).

He left the PUK in 2009 and became a member of Gorran.

Mustafa founded and was the first leader of the party. He died at the age of 73 in his hometown of Sulaimani on May 19, 2017, after spending years abroad for medical treatment.

Mustafa was also a former leader of the PUK before breaking away to establish the Gorran movement in 2009 due to escalating political infighting within the PUK.

Gorran currently holds 24 seats in the Kurdistan Region Parliament, the second largest party after the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP). 

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany