Employees' salaries secured until the end of 2020, Parliamentary Committee says

Shafaq News / A member in the Parliamentary Finance Committee stated on Friday that the 2020 budget will be approved next month, and the salaries of employees will be secured until the end of this year.

Ahmed Al-Saffar said in an interview with Shafaq News agency, "the budget law will be submitted to the parliament in ten days, and it will be voted on without delay".

He pointed out that, "the 2020 budget will secure the salaries of employees for the remaining three months of this year, and there are no fears of a crisis or a deficit in paying salaries".

Regarding parliamentary and governmental calls to renew internal and external borrowing to secure salaries, Al-Saffar noted that, "the budget includes internal and external borrowing within its law, and there will be no borrowing by another law outside the budget law as what happened 3 months ago to secure employees' salaries for the months of July, August and September".

It is noteworthy that Parliament approved on June 24 a bill submitted by the government for internal and external borrowing.

The government had submitted the bill, which allows an amount of foreign borrowing of $ 5 billion, as well as internal borrowing of $ 15 trillion to fill the country's fiscal deficit.

The Iraqi government is struggling to secure employee salaries and other operating expenses due to the drop in oil prices due to COVID-19, which has crippled large sectors of the world economy. The country relies on oil revenues to finance 95 percent of state expenditures.