ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Religious authorities in Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan Region have banned 45 Islamic preachers for charges ranging from defamation to abusing their leave. But some of the clerics themselves complain they were dismissed without explanation.

One of the sacked preachers told Rudaw he was informed he could no longer preach through a telephone call from the Ministry of Religious Affairs, and that he still did not know why he had been banned.

“I received a phone call two weeks ago telling me that I was banned from delivering Friday sermons, and that I was not allowed to pray in or visit the mosque at all,” said the sacked imam, or preacher, who did not wish to be identified.

The cleric, who had been preaching at a mosque in Erbil for nine years, said he immediately visited the minister of religious affairs and asked for an explanation.

“The minister told me he was unaware of the matter and did not know what it was all about,” he said.

But Mariwan Naqshbandi, spokesman for the religious affairs ministry, said that the errant preachers had breached one of the ministry’s three red lines: defamation, public incitement against national security and declaring fatwas, or Islamic decrees.

“Defamation is causing us a lot of trouble,” he explained.  “It was only the way the imams did their jobs that was questionable,” he added.

He said that if a person files a complaint against a preacher and provides evidence of defamation, “the Imam will be called to the ministry for questioning, and he will be stripped of his preaching rights” if proven guilty.

Naqshbandi said some of the imams had been dismissed because they had abused the ministry’s directives on preaching while on holiday leave.

“Some imams get two-year leaves to study abroad, and they are not allowed to deliver sermons while on leave,” he explained. “But some imams had signed up for distance education, and continued to preach while they were technically on leave.”

Hiwa Fahmi, 25, who attends different mosques in Erbil, said that the government was punishing critics, while allowing imams who support them to preach publicly as they please.

“An Imam in the Hawkari neighborhood was removed from his job after criticizing the government for the lack of potable water,” he said. “Imams who are close to Islamic parties are removed from their jobs, while Imams close to the government can freely call people names and no one can touch them.”

With close to 15,000 employees, the Kurdistan Region’s Ministry of Religious Affairs is one of the biggest ministries of the autonomous government. It runs 4,880 mosques and more than 2,500 imams and clerics across the region.

According to Naqshbandi every week more than half-a-million people attend Friday sermons at more than 2,500 mosques in the three-province enclave.