New privately-run speed cameras shot up by upset drivers in Iraqi Kurdistan

For the second time within months, angry gunmen opened fire on point-to-point speed cameras installed by a private-sector company in Sulaimaniyah province of the Iraqi Kurdistan region, as drivers and lawmakers say personal interests and not public safety was the motivation for the project.

According to documents published online by Kurdish lawmakers seen by The New Arab, the interior ministry of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has signed a contract with a local company in March 2021 to install 225 point-to-point speed cameras in Sulaimaniyah province and to install hundreds of cameras across the region in the near future. The project is estimated to cost more than three billion Iraqi dinars (more than US$ 2 million), and the income derived from fining drivers will go to the company for the next 15 years.

Ali Hama Salih, a Kurdish lawmaker in the Kurdistan parliament, has published documents that noted that also in return for carrying out the project, the company will purchase 403 new cars for the KRG. He also raised a legal case to the region's attorney general against the KRG and the company.

"I raised my complaint against the project to the region’s attorney general, they have asked the KRG ministry of interior to suspend the project as it is illegal but they did not take any legal measures against the ministry, I have asked the region’s attorney general that they should take measures," Hama Salih said to TNA.

"I think the KRG should not give such a project to the private sector as we have seen in the past companies only think of their own interests. Installing such a large number of cameras is not seen in any country in the world, there are only 19 speed cameras across Netherlands; is it reasonable that they have installed 225 cameras in one province while our roads and highways are so bad?" he added. 

The KRG's pretext for implementing the project is that the increasing casualties from traffic accidents, and it cannot implement the project itself. Local citizens and drivers, however, told TNA that the "only motive behind the cameras is collecting money for partisan-owned companies, and not public safety."

Sulaimaniyah Provincial Council has overwhelmingly voted to reject the project but the company is continuing to install more cameras. Consequently, unknown gunmen on Monday opened fire at one of the cameras at Dukan-Sulaimaniyah road. The company has raised a law case against the perpetrators.   

TNA has contacted the company, and Jotyar Adil, the KRG's formal spokesperson, but they were unavailable to comment.

Hakim Shex Latif Mustafa, a Kurdish legal expert wrote on his Facebook page that collecting the income from traffic fines is the exclusive power of the states and governments, and "by conceding this right to a private sector company, the KRG is formally giving up its governance".