KRG Issues a Statement Explaining the Delay of July's Salaries

PUKMEDIA

50,000 Iraqi Dinars, Iraqi Ministry of Finance logo, KRG logo

The Kurdistan Regional Government's (KRG) Ministry of Finance has provided an explanation for the delay in Baghdad's payment of July salaries. The reasons for this delay include the presence of duplicate names in the salaries list, the absence of biometric data for some people in the list, issues regarding the salaries of teachers and education employees in Kirkuk, and an increase in the requested salary amount for July compared to June.

Dr. Bryar Rashid, a member of the Iraqi parliament's Economic Committee, provided PUKMEDIA with another explanation for the July salary delay, saying that the lack of bank accounts for salaried employees and the failure to carry out the Federal Court's clear ruling that all employees must receive their salaries from federal banks are the main causes of the delay.

In a release, the Ministry of Finance of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) announced: "Following investigations, it has been determined that the duplication of names among salaried employees in both the Kurdistan Region and Baghdad does not pose any legal issues. Furthermore, it has been found that most of these individuals are legal employees with complete documentation. However, some of these employees benefit from social welfare assistance. So, instead of withholding the salaries, the Federal Ministry of Finance should have stopped the financial aid."

The KRG Finance Ministry stated that they informed the Federal Ministry of Finance that certain individuals on the KRG's salary list of employees and retirees had not completed the biometric procedure for a variety of reasons. "Using the national card that every employed person in Iraq, military and civilian, possesses, would have been far preferable," the KRG Ministry of Finance declared.

The KRG's Finance Ministry has attributed the increase in salary financing in July compared to June to the implementation of the Federal Court's ruling to equalise salaries of KRG employees and retirees with those of the federal government.

KRG's Finance Ministry explained: "The KRG has sent the retirees' salary list to Iraq following equalisation, resulting in a significant rise of 54,208,000,000 in the July salaries of Kurdistan employees. By deducting the aforementioned sum from the requested funds for the July salary, the remaining required funding amounts to around 956,876,000,000. This figure closely aligns with the funding that the Federal Ministry of Finance has allocated for the previous five months."

The Council of Ministers of the Kurdistan Region is scheduled to convene on Wednesday, August 21. The official website of the Council has indicated that the meeting would address several matters pertaining to the delayed payment of salaries for Kurdistan employees in July.

The employees of the Kurdistan Region have not received their salaries for about 50 days, despite the fact that 31 days ago the KRG sent the list of salaries to the Federal Ministry of Finance. Nevertheless, the Iraqi government has failed to deliver the complete payment to the Kurdistan Region due to the reasons mentioned above.

The federal ministry has only sent a sum of 1,426,000,000 IQD for the salaries of the Board of Supreme Audit, the Commission of Integrity, and the Board of Environmental Protection and Improvement. This amount represents only 00.14% of the overall salary of the Kurdistan Region.



PUKMEDIA