Demanding census, Kurdish lawmaker says Baghdad gives Erbil only a fraction of its entitlement

Demanding census, Kurdish lawmaker says Baghdad gives Erbil only a fraction of its entitlement
2023-02-20T15:40:18+00:00

Shafaq News/ What the Kurdistan region receives from Baghdad is merely 5% of its entitlement, a member of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) in the Iraqi parliament, Vian Dakhil, said on Monday.

"A delegation from the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) is in Baghdad for talks on mainly two issues: the region's share in the federal budget and the hydrocarbons law," Dakhil told Shafaq News Agency.

"Reaching a common ground before sending the budget bill to the parliament will nip the problem in the bud and spare the country all the ebbs and flows in the parliament hall," she continued.

"Deciding the share of any administrative unit in the budget without a census is impossible. Reducing the Kurdistan region's share from 17% to 14%, and then 12% was unjust, in our opinion. We demand carrying out the census to decide who gets what," she explained.

The lawmaker hoped that Prime Minister Mohammad Shia al-Sudani would fulfill his promises and "rely the census results in deciding the region's share in this budget bill, and all the budget bills in the future."

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