ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The Kurdistan Region's main opposition party, the New Generation Movement (NGM), will “under no circumstances” join the incoming Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), its spokesperson said Tuesday, adding that the group will remain in opposition instead.
"We will under no circumstances participate in the new [Kurdistan] Regional Government and will remain in opposition," Himdad Shahin said in a statement posted on his Facebook page.
The announcement comes days after the NGM declared that its "comprehensive" alliance with the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), formed in July, "remains open" to talks with other Kurdish parties on forming the next KRG government "based on election merits."
The Kurdistan Region held parliamentary elections in October 2024, with the ruling Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) winning 39 seats and the rival PUK securing 23 seats in the 100-seat legislature.
With no party achieving an absolute majority, the two sides have engaged in government formation talks that have since stalled over disagreements on governance structures and key posts.
The PUK has since joined forces with the NGM, which holds 15 seats in the Kurdish legislature, with the two parties claiming political leverage against the KDP and demanding larger shares in government posts.
The KDP previously rejected the arrangement, insisting it will negotiate with each party separately rather than as a single bloc.
Despite this, senior PUK politician and Deputy Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Qubad Talabani said Tuesday that efforts to expedite the government formation process “have been intensified” in recent days.
For his part, KDP spokesperson Mahmoud Mohammed told Rudaw on Tuesday that "some good news will emerge" in the coming days, adding that talks with the PUK "are underway and efforts are being exerted" to push government formation forward.
Notably, the NGM is the fourth party to announce a boycott of the upcoming KRG cabinet, following the Kurdistan Islamic Union (KIU), which holds seven seats in the Kurdish parliament, the National Stance (Halwest) with four seats, and the Kurdistan Justice Group (KJG) with three.
Meanwhile, the People's Front (Baray Gal) and the Change Movement (Gorran), which hold two and one seats respectively, remain undecided as both parties navigate internal divisions.
NGM's Tuesday decision not to join the KRG's tenth cabinet effectively leaves the KDP and PUK as the dominant players in government formation, echoing the pre-2014 power-sharing arrangement in which the two parties formed what they called a "broad-based government" by bringing other parties on board.
