KP not getting funds to fight terror: finance adviser

PESHAWAR: Rejecting the claim of the federal government that inflation rate had dropped to a single digit, Adviser to Chief Minister on Finance Muzzammil Aslam on Tuesday said it had in fact increased by 36 percent in the last one year.

Speaking at a press conference here, he said the price of onions had increased by 144 percent, vegetables by 57 percent, pulses by 23 percent and meat by 21 percent.

Muzzammil Aslam believed that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif was doing injustice to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. He said the prime minister announced additional funds for Balochistan to fight terrorism. However, he said the funds would be given from the National Finance Commission whereas Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which was badly hit by terrorism, was getting no grant.

He maintained that the financial position of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government was at its best keeping in view the last 76 years. He said the federal government had collected less tax amounting Rs98 billion in August hence Khyber Pakhtunkhwa would get over Rs8 billion less funds.

The adviser said that at a time when the economy was faltering, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government collected Rs7 billion in taxes in the first two months with an increase of 44 percent. He said that the provincial government reduced sales tax from 15 percent to 13 percent while property taxes were halved.

Muzzammil Aslam said that federal budgets were not sustainable as the figures shared with the media later turned out to be wrong.

He said that in the last 20 years, not a single federal budget came out right. He said the provinces prepared the budget by looking at the federal tax collection targets.

On the instructions of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the federal government announced a tax target of Rs12,900 billion, he said, adding that even the Federal Board of Revenue was not confident to achieve it.

The advisor on finance said that after Punjab’s government power subsidy for two months, the prime minister advised the provinces to do the same, which was against the IMF’s MoU signed by the provinces.

Commenting on reports that the federal government was planning to deduct funds from the provinces to provide an electricity subsidy of Rs2800 billion, he said that Rs231 billion would be deducted from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

With this amount only Rs6 unit relief is given to the whole of Pakistan, he added. “We believe that for Rs6 per unit subsidy, only Rs600 billion are needed,” he added.