Parliamentary Finance discusses a budget without schedules and recommends reducing expenditures

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[size=52]Parliamentary Finance discusses a budget without schedules and recommends reducing expenditures[/size]

[size=45]Baghdad / Firas Adnan[/size]
[size=45]Although about two weeks have passed since the government sent the budget, it is still in the office of Parliament Speaker Muhammad al-Halbousi, while the Finance Committee is conducting preliminary discussions on a draft devoid of schedules, recording some observations, most of which revolve around increasing operational amounts, with fears of not being able to cover the deficit. For the next two years, due to the depletion of funds retained.[/size]
[size=45]The Council of Ministers announced on the thirteenth of this month that it would vote on the budget bill for three years and send it to parliament.[/size]
[size=45]A member of the committee, Representative Mueen Al-Kazemi, said, “The budget arrived in Parliament more than ten days ago, but it has not been officially transferred from the Presidency to the Finance Committee, meaning that it is still in the office of Parliament Speaker Muhammad al-Halbousi.”[/size]
[size=45]And Al-Kazemi added, “During the past days, the Finance Committee held preliminary deliberative sessions regarding the budget, because the draft we have does not contain tables.”[/size]
[size=45]He pointed out, “This draft shows that the budget amounts to 199 trillion dinars, 150 trillion dinars of which go to the operational side, and the rest towards the investment side, which includes projects that institutions and governorates have, whether they are lagging or new ones.”[/size]
[size=45]And Al-Kadhimi stated, “The details of the budget were based on the price of $70 per barrel of oil, and made the value of the dollar 1,300 dinars.”[/size]
[size=45]And he talked about “preliminary observations with the Finance Committee on the draft, as it relies on the three-year system for 2023, 2024 and 2025, and this is something permitted by Federal Financial Management Law No. (6) of 2019 as amended.”[/size]
[size=45]Al-Kazemi stressed, “The need to review the government draft seriously and quickly and approve it within the appropriate opportunity, and this is what we seek in the Finance Committee, in coordination with the supporting committees and parliamentary blocs.”[/size]
[size=45]He explained, "Many matters related to the budget are due to the political consensus between the blocs, especially the coalition within the state administration coalition, and this includes the operational and investment aspects."[/size]
[size=45]Al-Kazemi spoke about "a basic and important point that the amount of the deficit, which amounts to 64 trillion dinars, is very large and will be repeated for three consecutive years."[/size]
[size=45]And he finds, “The deficit for this year will be covered through the previous financial abundance amounting to 23 trillion and deducting transfers to the treasury of the Central Bank, which are 23 trillion dinars, 5 trillion of national bonds, 3 trillion of loans from the Rashid, Mesopotamian and Commerce banks, with 10 trillion taken in the form of loans from foreign banks”.[/size]
[size=45]Al-Kazemi asked, "How to cover the deficit for the next two years, in light of the current resources?"[/size]
[size=45]And he stated, "The details that cover the deficit for the current year cannot be repeated in the same way, because we will lose the amounts transferred."[/size]
[size=45]Al-Kazemi believed, "This is a real problem that requires finding a clear solution to it, to prevent a financial vacuum in the state treasury."[/size]
[size=45]And he stressed, "Our efforts will focus on reconsidering the amount of the deficit by reviewing the amounts of the operational side of the budget."[/size]
[size=45]Al-Kadhimi noted that “parliamentary blocs support the investment budget, whatever it takes, or increase its amounts; Because we want to implement service projects for hospitals, schools, electricity and other vital aspects that were included in the ministerial curriculum voted on in Parliament when confidence was given to the government of Muhammad Shia’ al-Sudani.[/size]
[size=45]And he added, "The Iraqi constitution stipulates that parliament will continue its work during the season in which the budget arrives from the government, and therefore we will not enjoy any legislative recess, no matter how long the discussions are, until after the approval of this law."[/size]
[size=45]And Al-Kazemi concluded, “The budget, as I think it will take discussion on it for a period of time ranging from 30 to 45 days, with the hope that it will be implemented by a date no later than next May.”[/size]
[size=45]For his part, another member of the committee, Representative Jamal Cougar, stated that “the party that controls parliament and has the majority is the one that prepared the draft budget law.”[/size]
[size=45]And Cougar continued, “The discussions on the law based on this preponderance in Parliament will not take long and will not be delayed by political differences, given that all of them have been settled in the Council of Ministers.”[/size]
[size=45]He pointed out, "The Finance Committee will receive the project as soon as the first reading of it is completed in Parliament."[/size]
[size=45]Cougar confirmed, “Parliament has not initiated this reading until now, despite the passage of more than ten days since the arrival of the government draft.”[/size]
[size=45]And he goes on to say, “The constitution authorizes Parliament to have two competences when conducting the discussion on the budget law, which is to reduce the amounts that were mentioned in the government project or transfer between chapters, and if he wants to increase, then this will be necessary and based on the approval of the Council of Ministers,” ruling out “resorting to increasing the amounts because we will We are increasing the financial deficit gap, and this is an incorrect measure.”[/size]
[size=45]And Cougar concluded, “The political forces must be aware of the seriousness of the situation and speed up the approval of the budget, because the Iraqi street is waiting for many projects that cannot be proceeded with without financial allocations.”[/size]
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