PM to chair NEC meeting on Friday

Islamabad: Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi is scheduled to chair National Economic Council (NEC) meeting on coming Friday in which the government seeks approval for stopping expenditures on those new development projects where allocation was less than 25 percent of total approved cost during the current fiscal year, The News has learnt.

This step has been proposed for diverting development funds towards those projects which could be completed up to June 2018 in order to win support of masses keeping in view electioneering year after few months.

According to official summary moved to NEC, highest economic decision making forum of the country, the ministries/divisions were informed that the cut-off for approval of un-approved projects was December 31, 2017 so funds allocated to projects which were not yet approved by the envisaged deadline would be withdrawn and diverted to other fast moving projects.