Kurdistan's Ministry of Higher Education allows students abroad to return for parliamentary elections

Shafaq News/ The Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research in Kurdistan has issued a decision allowing Kurdish students studying abroad to return to the Region within a specified period to participate in the upcoming parliamentary elections.

According to an official document from the Minister of Higher Education, Aram Mohammad Qadir, Kurdish students studying outside the Region will be able to return to cast their votes in the parliamentary elections.

The ministry has set the period from October 12 to October 25 for this purpose.

This decision is part of efforts to encourage electoral participation and ensure that all citizens, including those studying abroad, have the opportunity to exercise their right to vote in the elections, which will form a new parliament for the Region.

In June, President Nechirvan Barzani issued a Regional decree setting October 20, 2024, as the official date for the Kurdistan parliamentary elections.

Elections for Kurdistan’s parliament, originally scheduled for 2022, were set for June 10. However, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), which has the parliamentary majority, announced it would boycott the election in protest of a ruling issued by Iraq's Federal Supreme Court.

This court decided to cancel 11 seats reserved for minority groups, including Turkmen, Assyrians, Christians, and Armenians, reducing the number of Regional Parliament seats to 100.

The ruling also changed the electoral system, dividing the Kurdistan Region into four constituencies instead of the single-constituency system used in the 2018 elections.

The federal court ruling also gave authority to the Iraqi IHEC to organize and oversee Regional elections instead of the Kurdish Regional Election Commission.

In late May, the federal court issued a new ruling restoring five seats reserved for minorities, a move that Kurdish officials said helped ease tensions and convinced the KDP to agree to participate in the October elections.

The October vote is expected to elect 100 new lawmakers representing the governorates of Iraqi Kurdistan: Erbil (34 seats, including one for Christians and one for Turkmen), Halabja (three seats), Al-Sulaymaniyah (38 seats, including one for Christians and one for Turkmen), and Duhok (25 seats, including one for Christians).