International Center for Development Studies (ICDS) warned on the bankruptcy of Iraq in three years because of the budget deficit

Shafaq News / A report issued by the International Center for Development Studies (ICDS) , based in London warned on Thursday from the bankruptcy of Iraq in three years because of the budget deficit which now threatens the Iraqi oil sector clearly, as the report indicated that the military operations in Anbar cost per day seven million dollars.

According to the report , the deficit exceeded $ 50 billion , Iraq would be at risk of bankruptcy in 2017 . Iraq will be unable to pay the salaries of its employees . It seems that the indicators of bankruptcy is looming , especially that the Iraqi government pays the salaries of its employees , including the salaries of the staff of Kurdistan Region in monthly form, which has allocated 4.5 billion dollars for February and did not send the salaries of next March , because the available amount is not enough but for one-third of the staff of Iraq .

The report pointed out that the deduction of 15% of the budget allocated to investments in oil has contributed to reduce Iraqi exports of 2.62 million barrels per day to 2.28 million barrels per day during the past three months , what impact clearly on state revenues and plans to increase exports to more than 3.5 million barrels during 2014 .

The report adds, that the giant oil companies are unable to cope with the volatile environment of the Iraqi economy threatening to withdraw from it. In addition to the security factor that reveals the financial and administrative corruption, bureaucracy, lack of experience and the need for Iraq to infrastructure and train 70 thousand workers in the oil sector to reach the desired goals.

The report refers that “BP “company has cancelled contracts of dozens of foreign contractors in South Rumaila field and threatened to withdraw from Eni Zubair field in Basra because of bureaucratic complications that delayed the signing one of the contracts for six months.

The cost of Anbar war is 7 million dollars a day

It seems that the budget deficit in Iraq has contributed to weaken the state's ability to establish security , being engaged in a war in Anbar that cost the Iraqi economy seven million dollars a day , which is exhausting burden to the budget and affect the state's ability to carry its other burden in the defense of the rest of Iraq .

The report of ICDS notes to the real deficit in the Iraqi budget which has risen today to 32 billion dollars in the absence of an agreement between Baghdad and Erbil on oil exports , the adoption of five dollars in compensation to each oil producer province and the adoption of laws that do not fit with Iraq's ability to carry its financialburden.

The budget deficit is not justified

ICDS believes that the deficit is not justified , for the fact that the budget has been prepared on the basis of price of $ 90 a barrel , while the price of oil did not get less than $ 100 , meaning that the budget must achieve a large surplus , especially that the completion rates in most Iraqi provinces did not exceed 40 % and in some of them was zero.

In addition for that, the retained amounts from previous budgets up to 2012 was more than 50 billion dollars , raising questions about the real reason to talk about the deficit , if not a new attempt aimed to steal the public money and convert the benefits to personal gains of senior officials in the state.

Nouveaux

The report of the International Center for Development Studies explains that financial and administrative corruption in Iraq has led to the emergence of a new class of rich people and new entrepreneurs affiliated with the Iraqi government , who came to get rich quickly , prompting the emergence of a market for luxury goods in Iraq , most notably the private aircraft in which its prices could reach $ 16 million , while a third of the Iraqi people live under the poverty line .

That issue has led the Ministry of Transport to issue checks for the purchase of these aircraft , which means that the volume of applications submitted needed the issuance of such instructions.

The report expressed surprise that economist and advisers to the Iraqi government were able to prepare budgets since 2004 , in the absence of clear closing accounts that show real spending for its resources and allows control orders on the exchange , indicating clearly the fears of disclosing them and deliberately hiding them for fear of detecting large financial and administrative corruption in Iraq for years.




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