Allawi distances himself from recent multiple-million fraud scandal

Shafaq News / Iraq's resigning Minister of Finance, Ali Abdul Amir Allawi, issued on Wednesday a statement regarding the multiple-million US dollars fraud.

A statement issued by Allawi's media office said that the latter, "submitted his resignation on August 16, 2022 from the Iraqi government, after making it clear that the state institutions' situation is deteriorating, especially those in the finance and banking sector."

"Two months after the resignation, we are facing one of the biggest financial frauds in modern history."

It added that during the previous parliament era, the finance committee requested on July 13, 2021, to limit carrying out Tax and customs audits to the General Tax Authority, with no intervention from the Financial Supervision Bureau, noting that the latter and the Prime Minister's office have exchanged letters about the same topic, and the Bureau showed support for the finance committee's suggestion.

The statement added that to ensure that taxes are not tampered with, the Minister of Finance issued on August 5, 2021 Ministerial Order No. 5, in which he decided to form a central ministerial committee to organize and supervise the tax work. However, the new measures made it impossible to control the tax work, after the accused party resorted to using fake transactions.

The former minister indicated that the Integrity Commission opened an investigation into some suspicious transactions, and the results were disclosed in the Federal Integrity Commission letter No. T5/7079 on August 31, 2021: the commission did not halt the retrieval of the suspicious tax funds.

The Integrity commission's letter confirmed taking the appropriate measures, the statement said, pointing out that the Minister of Finance informed the Prime Minister's office, several times, of the risks involved in allowing this situation to continue.