Hussein's birthday noted with reflection

TIKRIT, Iraq -- The American general who now commands the hometown of Iraq's deposed dictator wanted it clear that Saddam Hussein's decades of birthday parties are over.

"It's not lost on any of us in this room that this is Saddam's birthday and we're holding a press conference in one of his old palaces," Major General John R. S. Baptiste, commander of the Army's First Infantry Division, said yesterday in a marble domed foyer capped with an ostentatious fake gold and rhinestone light fixture. "He's gone and he's gone forever. We're looking forward to a free and democratic Iraq."

Baptiste -- perhaps intentionally adding insult to injury -- put a curfew on Tikrit and neighboring villages yesterday to quell any planned celebrations, and soldiers tore down newly hung portraits of the former leader in an area of Iraq where people still openly express fondness and longing for him.

But in Baghdad, the dictator's birthday provoked quiet reflection among Iraqis accustomed to forced triumphal celebrations.

"The Ba'athists used to come around a week before and remind us about Saddam's birthday," recalled Laman Abdul Rahim, 51, sipping coffee in her living room.

Party officials would order shopkeepers to light candles in their windows and women such as Rahim to decorate her house. Schoolchildren would be forced to learn special songs. To the horror of parents like Rahim, some children would be selected to meet with the Iraqi president; for security, they would be quarantined from their families for the full week before the birthday.

"We always would be curious to see what shape his birthday cake would be," Rahim said. "One year it would be shaped like a sword, another year a mosque."

Adil Abdul Razak, 38, a civil servant at the state-owned electricity utility, remembered Hussein's birthday festivals as an unbearable nuisance.

"The Ba'athists would seize all the buses to transport students from schools to the parade ground," Razak said. "Life would stop. You couldn't get anywhere in the city."

Rahim's husband, Ayad Sideeq al-Jadir, 52, had a birthday message: "In his jail cell I want Saddam to remember how he treated the Iraqis during his rule.

"Saddam was so arrogant, he never thought would one day find himself in a place like this."

Wherever he is -- US authorities won't say where he is being held or when he will stand trial for human rights violations or war crimes -- the former ruler's only known visitor this week was a Red Cross team that inspected the conditions of his incarceration on Tuesday.

Baptiste has his own ideas about clearing the Hussein loyalists who still predominate in the area around Tikrit. In the last six weeks, his soldiers have detained 680 people, he said.

But he's wooing tribal sheiks and former military officers, even nominating some for senior positions in the new Iraqi Army, in the hopes of winning their loyalty.

"Tikrit has the potential for a lot of trouble," Batiste said. "Our secret is engagement."

Globe correspondent Shatha al-Awsy contributed to this report from Baghdad.