(region without salary) and (salary without region)
By Hogr Ibrahim Hakeem
Iraq’s federal system, codified in a permanent but ambiguous and uneven constitution, has faced significant challenges in addressing core governance questions. From its inception, Iraqi federalism has been plagued by several critical issues:
First, the federal structure suffers from severe imbalance due to a flexible constitutional framework that lacks clarity.
Second, the federal system lacks genuine institutional protection. While theoretically defended by two entities, both have proven inadequate: The Kurdistan Region, despite being the primary beneficiary of federalism, has experienced internal political turmoil that has fueled anti-federal sentiment among its population. Meanwhile, the Federal Supreme Court, rather than safeguarding federalism, has consistently ruled against federal principles in major cases, reflecting a centralized mindset that undermines the system it should protect.
Third, neighboring countries have actively opposed Iraq’s federal experiment, viewing its potential collapse as beneficial to preserving their own national unity.
Fourth, there exists fundamental distrust in the system itself. The governing establishment perceives federalism as dangerously close to secessionism rather than a mechanism for managing diversity. This flawed perspective has led them to believe that undermining federal institutions is necessary to prevent separation, and this misconception has shaped the political agenda of the anti-federal majority in power.
Consequently, the way power operates and is exercised has inevitably intensified divisions to the point where complete mistrust now prevails. This mindset has actively promoted centralization through the mechanisms of governance. Extensive documentation isn’t necessary to demonstrate that throughout two decades of federal governance, public policy has consistently strengthened centralization, making it the primary threat to the federal system’s survival.
These centrally-designed and executed public policies—which lack the fundamental characteristics of democratic governance—have produced two key results:
First, they have eroded confidence in the federal system itself.
Second, they have facilitated a return to centralized rule disguised under dubious claims of legitimacy.
The Issue of Salaries and the Intersection of Federalism
The fiscal dispute between the Kurdistan Region and federal government is not a recent development but stems from the inherently unbalanced constitution. The federal authorities, after testing all the challenges, have reached the belief that this gateway is the most effective gateway through which they can eliminate federalism and talk about confronting this action. In this, they have largely succeeded in achieving their goals.
The question of whether salaries will be paid has become an absurd issue within federal frameworks, its answer is tied to changes in those fundamental components upon which the system in Iraq is established. The statements of the Prime Minister (Mohammed Shia al-Sudani) that he expressed through the Region’s internal spokespersons, saying ((The way the Region requests salaries is not federalism, if you (meaning the Region) don’t want federalism, tell us frankly so we can establish salary payment mechanisms)). This is the frankest statement by the federal authority elite in which the desire to destroy federalism is embedded.
Whatever the excuses for cutting are, whether justified or unjustified, ultimately this is a public policy formulated to weaken the federal system. This manufactured crisis is not the essence of the matter, but rather a tool to pave the way for raising the fundamental question: will federalism continue or will it retreat toward complete failure? pay attention to those solutions presented by the federal authorities – all of them are meant to tell us that federalism does not benefit Iraq, but unilateral decision-making by central authorities will have bad consequences, so work has been done to make the Region voluntarily abandon federal principles. It is not without reason that a group of advocates of this discourse daily talk about testing this option too.
this issue puts us before a dangerous intersection: either a region without salaries, or salaries without a region. But what gives hope is how to find a third way between this dangerous intersection.