The Iraqi finance ministry sent a technical team to Erbil to work with the Kurdish ministry of finance to rescale and revise the monthly budget of the Region from the beginning of 2024 until November, Rebaz Hamlan, deputy finance minister of Iraq, said in a post on Facebook.
The federal minister of finance had asked for a list of Kurdish salaries and operating expenses, local revenues spent, and the money sent from Baghdad to the Kurdistan Region, especially for paying civil servants’ salaries. This review took 10 days and the technical teams finished the work on Saturday.
“With everyone’s help we are working towards ending the technical issues,” wrote Hamlan.
A senior Kurdistan Region finance ministry official and their technical team are going to Baghdad on Sunday to follow up, he added.
Civil servants in the Kurdistan Region and employees in disputed areas such as Kirkuk, whose payroll is managed by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), went over two months without receiving their salaries. Due to the delays, most schools and universities across the Sulaimani and Halabja provinces have boycotted classes since December 1.
The KRG did make some salary payments this week.
During a parliamentary session earlier this month, Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani told lawmakers that the federal budget allocation for the Kurdistan Region’s civil servant salaries has been depleted and that increasing the funds would require a reallocation from another area of the budget. Sudani suggested that the resumption of the Kurdistan Region’s oil exports, which have been stalled since March last year, could help resolve the problem.
He also remarked that the KRG needs to comply with its obligations, particularly handing over non-oil revenues to the federal government, something he said Erbil has failed to do so far.
