Request for promotion of Kurdistan Regional Government employees (247/ Federal/ 2023)

Dr. Yousef Mohammed
Since late 2015 and early 2016, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) authorities have unjustly suspended the promotion of all employees in the region through several decisions and instructions. This has caused huge losses to the employees of the region and, despite the forced savings and salary cuts in recent years, the suspension of promotions is a continuous and monthly deduction from the salaries of employees. However, the suspension of promotions will also affect the pension because the pension will be determined on the basis of the employee’s last basic salary.

The suspension of promotions is contrary to Articles 6, 7, 8, 9 of the amended Public and Public Sector Employees Salary Law No. 22 of 2008, which was implemented in the Kurdistan Region immediately after its enactment without the implementation law being passed by the Kurdistan Parliament. Therefore, after the success of the request of the pensioners of the region No. (212 / Federal / 2022) (1), we decided to prepare a request to resolve the issue of promotion. After a thorough investigation of the issue and preparing the evidence, we wrote the first draft of the lawsuit on April 24, 2023 and, with the help of a dear lawyer friend, we reviewed it several times and discussed it with other friends.

While we were discussing the lawsuit with the protesting employees and teachers and looking for a lawyer to file the lawsuit, we noticed a lawsuit on the same issue No. (134 / Federal / 2023) filed in the Federal Supreme Court The measures taken by the second Minister of Finance in this regard and the first hearing of the case was held on (14-8-2023). We knew that the application was wrong and would be rejected. Finally, the Federal Supreme Court gave its final decision on the application on September 10, 2023 and unfortunately, as we expected, it rejected the application unanimously. This made our task more difficult because there is now a negative judicial precedent on the issue of promotion. However, we decided to try our best to correct this, especially since our application was prepared in a completely different way. They filed the petition on the basis of Article 93, which is wrong in this case, but we filed the petition based on Article 93, which deals with the power of the Federal Supreme Court to decide issues arising from the implementation of a federal law The rules of the Federal Supreme Court state that: “The text or act must have been issued by one of the federal authorities mentioned in Article 47 of the Constitution”.
In early September last year, we contacted a number of protesting teachers and employees and a number of them became plaintiffs in the lawsuit: (1. Azhi Barzan Arif, 2. Mohammed Hussein Karim, 3. Khabat Latif Marf, 4. Najmuddin Mohammed Saleh Karim, 5. Dilawar Ali Mohammed 6. Awat Azad Mohammed Tal, 8. Saman Ali Saleh, 9. A large number of dissatisfied teachers court appearance). Dr. Ghalib Mohammed Ali contacted his lawyer Karwan Shahab Ahmad to take over the case. Finally, on (5-10-2023) the lawsuit was filed under number (247/ Federal/2023). In the petition, we requested the court to order the prime minister and the minister of finance and economy to properly implement the salary law of public and public sector employees No. 22 of 2008, especially articles 6, 7, 8, 9 of the law Employees are innocent because they have been fired by people who do not have the authority to do so.

The first hearing of the case was held on (26-11-2023) and four hearings were held until (25-2-2024). In the last hearing, the Federal Supreme Court set the date of (17-3-2024) for decision. However, in the previous hearing, we noticed that the President of the Court pointed out that in their previous decision on the salaries of employees and pensioners No. (224 and 269 / Federal / 2023) indicated that there should be equality.

The Federal Supreme Court today announced its final decision in the case and rejected the application by a majority of judges “for lack of specialty. Although we have to wait for the publication of the full decision, but it is remarkable how the court held four hearings in this case, but then the majority of judges decide that the case is not their specialty? In several other decisions, the Court has decided to oblige the various authorities to properly implement the constitution, laws and applicable decisions, such as both decisions (164/Federal/2023) and (190/Federal/2023) (4).

Now the ball is in the court of the Kurdistan Regional Government to correct the salaries of all employees and restore promotions that according to an investigation by Drew Media, about six trillion dinars have been lost. Especially now that the issue of providing the salaries of all employees in the region becomes an obligation of the federal government. This is also true for the pensioners. The implementation of the court decision No. (212 / Federal / 2022) is a constitutional and legal evidence both to restore the rights of pensioners and to justify any increase in the amount of pensioners. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) authorities are facing a test not to sacrifice the people to their political conflicts and to use the implementation of the decisions of the Federal Supreme Court as an opportunity to revive people’s lives and revive the region’s economy.
The Federal Supreme Court today rejected two lawsuits filed by MP Bassem Khashani against the Speaker of the House of Representatives and former Speaker Mohammed Halbusi.

Margins:
1. See the text of the court’s decision on the case of pensioners on the website of the Federal Supreme Court at this link:
https://iraqfsc.iq/crarid/212_fed_2022.pdf
2. See page 3 of the text of the decision on the Federal Supreme Court website at this link
https://www.iraqfsc.iq/crarid/134_feda_2023.pdf
3. See page 12 of the text of the judgment at:
https://www.iraqfsc.iq/crarid/224_fed_2023.pdf
4. See the text of both decisions consecutively at the following links:
https://www.iraqfsc.iq/crarid/164_fed_2023.pdf

https://www.iraqfsc.iq/crarid/190_fed_2023.pdf
5. See: Darw Arabiya, More than 5 trillion dinars The volume of debts in the regional government for employees resulting from the end of job promotions, at:
6. https://drawmedia.net/ar/page_detail?
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