QWP calls for consensus over military operation

CHARSADDA: Qaumi Watan Party (QWP) provincial Chairman Sikandar Hayat Khan Sherpao on Monday said the leaders of political parties in general and the ones belonging to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, in particular, should have been invited to the meeting of the Apex Committee to take them into confidence about the launch of the Operation Azm-e-Istehkam.

Speaking at a press conference at Sherpao village in Charsadda, he said that without taking all the stakeholders into confidence, it would be difficult to achieve the 100 percent results from the military operation.

Sikandar Sherpao said the political parties had been taken into confidence before launching Operation Zarb-e-Azb in the past. The QWP leader said it should be investigated whether or not the National Action Plan was implemented in letter and spirit.

He questioned who facilitated the militants to regroup after the operation Zarb-e-Azb.Commenting on the federal budget, he said the GDP growth rate of 3.6 would be difficult to achieve during the next financial year as the 2.2 growth rate for the current year was achieved with a lot of difficulty.

Sikandar Sherpao said the federal government did not pay any heed to the agriculture sector in the budget, adding that it was the agriculture sector that contributed the most to the country’s GDP. He said the government should reduce imports to save money. The QWP leader said unfortunately the government had increased taxes on the exporters besides hiking the power tariff which would raise the production cost.

He said the federal budget had a total outlay of 18 billion dollars of which nine billion dollars would be spent on debt-servicing thus the government would have to take more loans. The QWP leader feared that inflation would rise in the future, adding it seemed the government would introduce a mini-budget in September or October.

He said the government had increased its non-development expenditures by 32 percent which belied its claims about adopting austerity measures. The QWP leader said the people of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were facing the worst kind of power loadshedding despite the fact that the province produced surplus electricity. He rejected the impression that KP recorded the highest line losses in the country.