Iraq ‘wasta’ system favours lucky few

Abu Zeinab says only one of his five adult children has a job, and he only got it through “wasta”, the system of “who you know” that is Iraq’s pervasive scourge.

The practice has fuelled frustration, mass anti-government protests and waves of emigration from the oil-rich, war-scarred and poverty-stricken country, say analysts.

“All my children, including my three daughters, have finished their university studies, but only one has been able to find a job,” said Abu Zeinab, a 60-year-old retiree living in Baghdad. “The others are trying, without success.”

For his 28-year-old son, wasta turned out to be the “joker” that made all the difference, when a relative helped him land a coveted contract job, renewed annually, with a government ministry.

“Poverty pushes people towards wasta,” said the patriarch, with resignation in his voice. Wasta refers to using one’s family, communal or party connections to obtain jobs and benefits -- something that is universal but seen as especially widespread and corrosive in Iraq.

While the lucky few get well-paying and secure jobs with generous pensions, nearly 40 per cent of young people are unemployed, with few prospects for their future. Anger at the patronage, nepotism and cronyism that underpin the system was amid the key grievance expressed by protesters in a wave of mass rallies in late 2019.

It is the hopelessness felt by those who miss out that has fuelled the widespread wish to leave Iraq, say analysts.

The latests waves of emigration have seen thousands of Iraqis freeze on the Belarus-Polish border, and some perish when their boat capsized in the icy waters of the Channel.

Some 95 per cent of Iraqis say wasta is needed “often or sometimes” to find a job, according to the World Bank’s so-called Arab Barometer Report of 2019.

“All of society agrees that without wasta you cannot achieve anything,” said political scientist Thamer al-Haimes.

The problem results from a “weakness of the law” which fails to create a level playing field, he said, and “hinders the development of the country” while driving emigration.