Who is disrupting the sessions? Everyone is accused and everyone denies it.
Who is disrupting the sessions? Everyone is accused and everyone denies it.
9-8-2025
Information/Report..
With only three months remaining in the current parliamentary term before the parliamentary elections scheduled for next November, the performance of parliament has become a subject of widespread debate among Iraq’s political elite, particularly with the faltering convening of sessions. There has been increasing talk of political influence, consensus, and the role of politics in the “deliberate sabotage” of the country’s legislative institution. This has made the current parliamentary session the most unsuccessful of its kind, according to the admission of members of parliament and politicians. While political forces are squabbling over each other and accusing each other of obstructing parliament’s work by preventing a quorum, all parties are complicit in this obstruction, according to footage of the sessions broadcast by official Iraqi media.
In this context, the head of the “Generations” parliamentary bloc, MP Mohammed Al-Sayhoud, said in a previous interview with Al-Maalouma Agency that “all blocs in parliament are absent from sessions, but some of them accuse each other, and there is no bloc that can be considered more disciplined than others, because political moods regarding draft laws in the House of Representatives control attendance or absence, and we saw this with the draft law on the Popular Mobilization Forces, where the large blocs within parliament deliberately absent themselves and mobilize in order to prevent attendance and voting on the law, and this matter applies to other draft laws,” explaining that “political differences disrupt the work of parliament.”
Al-Sayhoud added that “the Iraqi parliament is witnessing a lack of harmony and agreement on several levels, including the political aspect between the parties and what relates to the presidency of the parliament itself, specifically between the parliament speaker and his first deputy. This is clear to all members of the House of Representatives, and is part of the obstruction of sessions and the passage of laws.” He pointed out that “the stubbornness of some blocs and their absence from attendance at the orders of party leaders has become a negative phenomenon and has a direct impact on the citizen who awaits laws that serve him, and indicates a state of popular distrust in the legislative authority.”
For his part, Member of Parliament Nazem Al-Shabli stressed that the House of Representatives continues to suffer from a clear weakness in its legislative and oversight role, describing it as “incapable” of discussing laws and vital issues that affect citizens’ lives and impact the country’s stability both internally and externally.
Al-Shabli told Al-Maalouma News Agency, “The performance of the House of Representatives in discussing key issues remains weak and slow, particularly with regard to issues that directly concern citizens, in addition to issues of a regional nature that affect Iraq’s relationship with its neighbors.”
He added, “It is essential that the session agendas include sensitive and crucial issues, such as the water crisis with Turkey, the oil smuggling issue and its impact on the economy, as well as issues of combating money laundering and the dollar exchange rate, given their direct repercussions on citizens’ lives.”
Al-Shabli called on the Council’s presidency to “include these issues among the priorities of the upcoming sessions, and to exploit the remaining life of the current parliamentary term to address urgent crises.”
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