On April 19, 2023
Independent/- At a time when the Iraqi parliament succeeded in reading the draft financial budget law for the years 2023, 2024 and 2025 a second, which was supposed to pave the way for its presentation to a vote during the parliament sessions after the Eid al-Fitr holiday.
But political differences remain a barrier to the possibility of passing them without amendments. According to the corridors of the political blocs, which are beginning to be evident through the parliamentary debate on some aspects of spending, political forces still need more discussions and concessions.
All political blocs, including the State Administration Coalition, which is behind the formation of the current government, are concerned about the budget, but the biggest concern lies in it being a three-year budget, which is unusual in Iraqi political and parliamentary life after 2003; given the need of all political forces to balance as a weapon with several borders for each political party.
Although legal expert Ali Al-Tamimi believes that “merging budgets for the next three years is constitutionally and legally possible,” but the political forces fear that the government will expand as they believe as their powers, as well as that the political forces do not want the government to implement the paragraphs of its ministerial program without going through parliament on the pretext that parliament voted for a three-year budget.
Al-Tamimi adds in his interview with Asharq Al-Awsat, that “the merger process is based on Article 78 of the Iraqi Constitution and Article 4 paragraph 2 of the Financial Management and Public Debt Law No. 6 of 2019». He says those constitutional and legal articles “apoured the merger so that the first year is obligatory while the subsequent two budgets are subject to adjustment by Parliament depending on the circumstances.”
In this context, Deputy in the Iraqi Parliament, Alia Nassif, of the State of Law Coalition, confirmed that Prime Minister Mohammed Shiaa Al-Sudani continues his intensive meetings with the forces of the Shiite coordination framework and the State Administration Coalition to resolve differences on the budget. Nassif added in a statement that “the budget has suffered throughout the history of previous governments not to approve it on the New Year, but extends to six months of the following year, and therefore projects are full in all governorates,” noting that there is “the desire of the Prime Minister to complete the projects and provide support until they are completed, which is positive.”
She added, “The first issue to be resolved is the duration of the three years, the deficit and the change of some numbers in them, in addition to the oil price bumps and the tables that accompanied the budget in 2023 only without 2024 and 2025.” She explained, “Every year, political blackmails occur on the budget and are subject to the requests of the political blocs, which burdens the draft, and the result is appealed to the Federal Court.” She pointed out that “to address this imbalance and for the sustainability of projects and the stability of the economy and investment, it has been relied on to proceed for three years and we may need an article authorizing the House of Representatives to submit an amendment proposal to change some of its numbers, especially with regard to the price of a barrel of oil estimated in it.”
In addition, according to a political source close to the atmosphere of political negotiations in the closed rooms on the budget, “the problem with this budget is complex, part of its problem is the ability of Prime Minister Mohammed Shiaa Al-Sudani to embarrass everyone, whether they are his declared supporters or partners waiting for what they can get to support, by designing a budget for the next three years.”
This political source of the Saudi newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat and its independent follow-up says that “even the main partners or supporters of Sudan, who are the coalition of state administration are not on the same position, but each of them wants its share of the budget, even if it is under different justifications such as the large deficit it includes, the variables of oil prices and the difference in spending in a number of its doors, all of which fall under what can be called the word of truth, which is meant to be invalid,” noting that “at the same time, all these parties, based on the crisis of confidence among them, are trying to obtain the largest number of gains from the budget for electoral and political purposes, while the Prime Minister wants to link each paragraph One of the paragraphs of the budget is its ministerial platform that includes the implementation of thousands of projects, especially those related to infrastructure and that need appropriate financial covers for them for the next three years without necessarily returning to parliament to give its approval on them unless changes in oil prices rise or fall.
In this context, a member of the Finance Committee in the Iraqi parliament, Jamal Kujar, believes in a statement that “the budget law is not without political differences, especially since there is an objection by various political parties to making the budget for three years, as well as there is a political objection to the shares of the financial governorates.”
“After the second reading of the budget law, the budget law will enter into dialogues and negotiations between political forces for the purpose of agreement and approval, and discuss the possibility of amending some paragraphs of the law; therefore, passing the budget will not be easy with political differences around it,” Cougar said.
According to a report by the Parliamentary Finance Committee, the draft budget, despite reading it again, still faces many challenges, most notably the large size of allocations required to finance state institutions, the large size of the planned deficit and its sources of financing, increasing unemployment rates, poverty rates, economic inflation, and the challenges of providing financial liquidity in the short or medium term as a result of the lack of financial imports that reject the budget.
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