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Kurdistan
Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Economy and Finance Ministry building in Erbil. Photo: Rudaw TV
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — Five months after a contentious reform bill was signed into law, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has begun its implementation, starting with the restructuring of the Ministry of Peshmerga Affairs pensions.
All pensions associated with the Ministry will be incorporated into and paid from the Economy and Finance Ministry’s General Directorate of Pensions based on the provisions of the reform law.
The controversial bill, titled the Reform of Pensions, Salaries, Allowances, Grants and other Benefits, was passed in mid-January and signed into law by the President of the Kurdistan Region in early February.
The legislation’s stated aims include the elimination of ghost employees, other fraudulent claims to more than one civil service salary, the reduction of high pensions for MPs and other high ranking officials, as well as the standardization of retirement regulations. The law also seeks to eliminate illegally retired individuals, who have never served in government or security institutions, but receive retirement pay due to their association with party patronage networks.
The initial step of the law’s implementation applies to all pensioners of the Peshmerga ministry’s three directorates - including the one associated directly with the ministry, as well as the 80 and 70 unit forces of the ministry, which respectively belong to the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK).
"The finance ministry is able to, according to the reform law, deal with them [pensions previously on the Peshmerga ministry's payroll]. They receive salaries from the Peshmerga ministry. Now that the law is being implemented... we are preparing the list of our pensions and submitting them to the finance ministry," Brig. Gen. Sarhad Jalal, head of the Pension Directorate of the Ministry of Peshmerga Affairs, told Rudaw.
"We have also informed the 70 and 80 unit forces. They will soon submit their own pensionary list. Once we receive, we will submit them as well to the general directorate of the pensionary [from the finance ministry," he added.
In addition to the Peshmerga ministry's pensioners, reforms will apply to a list of war-wounded Peshmerga veterans numbering around 10,000.
Jalal says that medical inspections have been conducted several times on those who have applied to wounded war veterans, with around "4,000 of them not passing the tests and being disqualified to be considered wounded veterans, yet they continue to receive salaries."
The finance ministry's pension directorate has embarked on upgrading to an electronic system to simplify the additional pension caseloads they expect to receive. They say by organizing pensioners in a database, they will be able to detect unlawfully administered salaries, believed to be thousands.
"Our database rejects names that have been retired unlawfully," Remand Khalid, the head of the General Directorate of Pensions from the Economy and Finance Ministry’s legal department, told Rudaw. "Our database is so advanced that it will be able to distinguish the unlawful pensions from the authentic ones."
According to data from Khalid's department, more than 247,000 people in the Kurdistan Region receive pensions from the government, including 91,000 Peshmerga soldiers, altogether costing the KRG 1.1 billion dinars. This figures makes up 12 percent of the overall salaries the government pays on a monthly basis.
All pensions associated with the Ministry will be incorporated into and paid from the Economy and Finance Ministry’s General Directorate of Pensions based on the provisions of the reform law.
The controversial bill, titled the Reform of Pensions, Salaries, Allowances, Grants and other Benefits, was passed in mid-January and signed into law by the President of the Kurdistan Region in early February.
The legislation’s stated aims include the elimination of ghost employees, other fraudulent claims to more than one civil service salary, the reduction of high pensions for MPs and other high ranking officials, as well as the standardization of retirement regulations. The law also seeks to eliminate illegally retired individuals, who have never served in government or security institutions, but receive retirement pay due to their association with party patronage networks.
The initial step of the law’s implementation applies to all pensioners of the Peshmerga ministry’s three directorates - including the one associated directly with the ministry, as well as the 80 and 70 unit forces of the ministry, which respectively belong to the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK).
"The finance ministry is able to, according to the reform law, deal with them [pensions previously on the Peshmerga ministry's payroll]. They receive salaries from the Peshmerga ministry. Now that the law is being implemented... we are preparing the list of our pensions and submitting them to the finance ministry," Brig. Gen. Sarhad Jalal, head of the Pension Directorate of the Ministry of Peshmerga Affairs, told Rudaw.
"We have also informed the 70 and 80 unit forces. They will soon submit their own pensionary list. Once we receive, we will submit them as well to the general directorate of the pensionary [from the finance ministry," he added.
In addition to the Peshmerga ministry's pensioners, reforms will apply to a list of war-wounded Peshmerga veterans numbering around 10,000.
Jalal says that medical inspections have been conducted several times on those who have applied to wounded war veterans, with around "4,000 of them not passing the tests and being disqualified to be considered wounded veterans, yet they continue to receive salaries."
The finance ministry's pension directorate has embarked on upgrading to an electronic system to simplify the additional pension caseloads they expect to receive. They say by organizing pensioners in a database, they will be able to detect unlawfully administered salaries, believed to be thousands.
"Our database rejects names that have been retired unlawfully," Remand Khalid, the head of the General Directorate of Pensions from the Economy and Finance Ministry’s legal department, told Rudaw. "Our database is so advanced that it will be able to distinguish the unlawful pensions from the authentic ones."
According to data from Khalid's department, more than 247,000 people in the Kurdistan Region receive pensions from the government, including 91,000 Peshmerga soldiers, altogether costing the KRG 1.1 billion dinars. This figures makes up 12 percent of the overall salaries the government pays on a monthly basis.
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