KRG declares holiday for natives of disputed areas to take part in census

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) on Thursday declared a week-long public holiday to enable its civil servants and students, who are original residents of the disputed areas, to return to their cities in order to participate in a crucial nationwide population census which is vital for the future of these territories. The government also urged the private sector to cooperate. 

The Diwan of the Kurdistan Region’s Council of Ministers explained that the decree, which covers civil servants, security forces, and students, was issued “for the purpose of facilitating the census process.”

It called on organizations, companies and private institutions to allow their staff members, who hail from the disputed areas, to return to their hometowns. 

The holiday starts on November 15 and ends on the second day of the census on November 21. 

Kirkuk and Nineveh provinces are among key areas disputed by Erbil and Baghdad. 

The census has raised concerns among some Kurdish officials about potential demographic shifts in disputed areas as hundreds of thousands of Kurds have fled these areas due to political and security reasons. 

Fahmi Burhan, head of the Kurdistan Region's board for disputed territories, said on Sunday that the former Kirkuk governor, an Arab, facilitated the movement of 600 thousand Arabs from other parts of Iraq to the disputed province, establishing several neighborhoods in only seven years. 

Turkmens have similar fears. 

Arshad al-Salihi, the head of the Iraqi Turkmen Front bloc at the Iraqi parliament, last month warned against the usage of the census in the country as a “political tool.” 

The ethnicity question had been a key obstacle to conducting a census between Baghdad and Erbil. A census could contribute to the resolution of many problems like Baathist-era Arabization, the status of disputed Kirkuk province, and the KRG’s share from the federal budget.

On Tuesday, Iraq’s Council of Ministers announced that it approved conducting the general population census nationwide, including the Kurdistan Region, after resolving “technical issues” with authorities in Erbil and increasing “the financial cost allocated for the census.”

In a bid to address the Kurdish concerns, the Iraqi government last week approved a KRG request to conduct the census based on the residents’ place of origin rather than their current place of residence, using information from the Iraqi migration ministry and the 1957 census for reference in the disputed areas.

The decision also indicates that KRG representatives can be present at data centers in Baghdad for transparency.

Iraq last conducted a census in 1997, excluding the provinces of the Kurdistan Region. The last census involving the Kurdistan Region was in 1987.

Estimates now put Iraq’s population around 50 million. A census planned for 2020 was postponed because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Iraq commenced its first phase in September by surveying and counting buildings.