Sadr City

Sadr City (Arabic: مدينة الصدر, romanized: Madīnat aṣ-Ṣadr), formerly known as Al-Thawra (Arabic: الثورة, romanized: aṯ-Ṯawra) and Saddam City (Arabic: مدينة صدام, romanized: Madīnat Ṣaddām), is a suburb district of the city of Baghdad, Iraq. It was built in 1959 by Prime Minister Abdul Karim Qassim and named Al-Rafidain District. After the US-led invasion of Iraq and the toppling of Saddam, it was unofficially renamed Sadr City after Ayatollah Mohammad Mohammad Sadeq al-Sadr. Sadr City – or more accurately Thawra District (Arabic: حيّ الثورة, romanized: Ḥayy ath-Thawra) – is one of nine administrative districts in Baghdad. A public housing project neglected by Saddam Hussein, Sadr City holds around 1 million residents.[1] The City (or District) was built in 1959 by Prime Minister Abdul Karim Qassim in response to grave housing shortages in Baghdad. At the time it was officially named Al-Rafidain District (Arabic: حي الرزفدين), but was colloquially called Al-Thawra (Arabic: الثورة) and so it came to be known by that name. It provided housing for Baghdad's urban poor, many of whom had come from the countryside and who had until then lived in appalling conditions. Naziha al-Dulaimi was instrumental in turning the vast slums of eastern Baghdad into a massive public works and housing project that came to be known as Revolution City. It quickly became a stronghold of the Iraqi Communist Party, with resistance to the Baathist-led coup of 1963 becoming prevalent within the city itself.[2] The development was devised by the Greek planner Constantinos Apostolou Doxiadis, who also designed Islamabad and Riyadh.[3] The original plans for the city were designed as part of Doxiadis’s Plans for Baghdad which were not fully completed as a result of the cancellation of the plans in 1959. Doxiadis Associates managed to develop the northeast side of Baghdad. This later developed as the nucleus for Al-Thawra City.[4]