As each election season approaches, Iraq’s walls and billboards fill with candidates’ photos and slogans. Social media overflows with images of campaign gifts – a food basket bearing a candidate’s picture. Or during the winter months, a blanket branded with another’s name. Such posts often trigger frustration among voters, who perceive these gestures as attempts to buy their support, particularly in the absence of substantive electoral programmes.
Election campaigns have long served to reinforce patterns of political clientelism in Iraq. Candidates often focus on promises of service provision rather than presenting programmes tied to the two core functions of parliament: legislation and oversight. This approach is further facilitated by the widespread public need for basic services.
The legislative and accountability functions of Iraq’s parliament (the Council of Representatives) have noticeably declined – in both quantity and quality – in recent sessions. In the current parliamentary term (2021–25), only three formal interrogation cases were recorded where MPs hosted senior officials to question them, of which just two were executed. This despite the fact that MPs claiming that more than 20 requests to interrogate senior officials, submitted to the speaker, remain pending.
Addressing this issue requires a comprehensive package of reforms that targets both the political system, by embedding transparency and accountability, and the technical work of parliament, by setting the rules needed to implement those measures effectively to re-establish parliament as a driver of accountable governance.
Deals Replace Reform
On the legislative side, dozens of laws were passed, yet only a few directly addressed citizens’ needs – such as the Emergency Support for Food Security and Development Law. Major items of structural legislation, including the Federal Court Law, the long-delayed Oil and Gas Law (pending since 2008) and the Health Insurance Law, have stalled. Meanwhile, some laws that did pass reflected sectarian, regional or ethnic biases because they were designed to appease specific constituencies. These included the General Amnesty Law, the Personal Status Law, and the Land Restitution Law, which were voted on together in a single package.
One major reason for this decline is that Iraq’s ruling elites have engineered a system that guarantees their impunity, with a deliberately weakened parliament at its core. As a result, many MPs are consumed by clientelist ‘service-oriented’ roles that have little connection to their legislative and legislative and oversight responsibilities.
The rise of the service-broker MP
Many MPs in Iraq assume a role almost identical to that of a service broker (known locally as mu‘aqqib). They use their offices as hubs where citizens can resolve stalled government work – from job applications and pensions to travel documents. At times MPs extend their actions to unlawful practices, such as converting government-owned vehicles for personal use or altering property titles to serve private interests rather than the public good. This behaviour reflects a deep dysfunction in state-citizen relations, reinforcing the public perception that institutions cannot meet citizens’ needs or deliver services without mediation or undue influence.
The phenomenon is not unique to Iraq. Similar practices have been recorded in democratic countries such as Greece, Spain, Turkey and some Asian states. In those cases, however, service roles have not eliminated or paralyzed parliaments’ constitutional functions, but operate within institutional systems that balance citizen representation with service delivery. For example, in Singapore MPs hold regular Meet-the-People Sessions (MPS) with their constituents to address personal issues related to housing, employment and work. However, these roles operate within an institutional framework that reinforces state authority. In Iraq, by contrast, service brokerage outweighs almost everything else, eroding much of the Council of Representatives’ constitutional role and weakening its ability to exercise oversight and pass laws that serve the public good.
The phenomenon of the service-broker MP in Iraq has evolved from individual initiatives into a widespread electoral approach, especially in poorer areas lacking basic services. Voters often feel compelled to support candidates who solve immediate problems rather than those who represent them politically. This does not indicate a lack of understanding of the legislative role of MPs, but rather reflects the distortions of the political system and the selective administration of public services. The service-broker MP has become the necessary intermediary for citizens navigating obstructive bureaucracy or administrative extortion, emptying the electoral process of political meaning and reducing it to a daily logic of transactional exchanges.
Strengthening parliament beyond brokerage
The spread of ‘brokerage’ cannot be blamed solely on MPs. It also reflects the weakness of the public service system, which forces citizens towards informal avenues to access basic rights. Regulating parliamentary work and dismantling the role of the service broker cannot be achieved by punishing or publicly shaming MPs, but rather by strengthening the state from within and promoting a culture of rights and duties, as well as institutionalizing the justice system. When legislators exercise their constitutional duties, they relieve institutions of pressure, thereby restoring trust in democracy as a system of rules rather than a network of patronage.
Weak legislative performance is likewise not just the result of individual behaviour. Policymaking in Iraq often takes place outside parliament, through party channels and informal networks of economic and administrative influence. This pushes MPs into service-broker roles because real decision-making tools are not in their hands. Parliamentary committees frequently act as rubber stamps for pre-arranged agreements, and efforts to shift the centre of decision-making back to the legislature are met with political co-optation, exclusion, or administrative and judicial obstruction.
Recommendations
To develop effective policy solutions and curb the phenomenon, the parliamentary code of conduct must first be revised. At present, it covers only MPs’ behaviour inside the chamber. It should instead set out clear rules defining the boundaries of parliamentary work and prohibiting MPs from acting as intermediaries. One further option is to establish independent civil service units within MPs’ offices, staffed by employees from relevant state institutions such as pension or migration departments. This would help institutionalize service-oriented functions and separate them from legislative functions.
Digitizing and fully automating government services could further tackle the phenomenon, as e-governance minimizes the need for a human broker to process paperwork. This would require parliament to pass the laws needed to facilitate the digital transition. Moreover, political education programmes targeted at voters, under the supervision of the Independent High Electoral Commission and civil society, could help shift public perceptions of MPs – from service providers to lawmakers and overseers of the executive.
Finally, the Council of Representatives should adopt a binding institutional pathway for policymaking. This would begin with the government publishing preliminary policy papers before introducing laws and budgets, followed by mandatory public hearings in parliamentary committees. Government responses would be required within specific timeframes. An independent unit for legislative and budgetary impact analysis would serve all committees and publish its reports. Transparency would be enhanced through a public log of MPs’ meetings with executive and party actors, and through legal protections for whistleblowers, MPs and technical staff.
This package of reforms would enable MPs to act as genuine representatives, legislators and overseers rather than service brokers. And it would help restore some of parliament’s capacity to influence decision-making according to clear rules, rather than through informal mediation.
This article is part of a special Iraq Initiative election series, featuring analysis and commentary on key developments shaping Iraq’s political landscape of the November 2025 parliamentary elections.
