Govt shouldn’t present budget of more than four months: Khursheed Shah

ISLAMABAD (92 News) – Leader of Opposition in National Assembly Syed Khursheed Shah on Friday said that the federal government shouldn’t present budget of more than four months. Talking to media in Islamabad, he said that the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) government wanted to play with Parliament’s supremacy. “Opposition will only accept a budget of four months,” he said and added the federal government has started a new tradition of presenting the budget for the whole year. The government has failed to give relief to the poor masses during its five year tenure, he added. On the other hand, the opposition parties have decided to lodge a strong protest during the budget session. The protest has been planned as opposition parties, including both the major political parties, Pakistan Peoples’ Party (PPP) and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) said that the outgoing government has no justification for presenting budget for the whole year. The three Chief Ministers of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Sindh and Balochistan had walked out of the meeting of National Economic Council’s (NEC) in protest. Meanwhile, the incumbent government is going to present its sixth consecutive Federal Budget for the year 2018-19, with an estimated outlay of over around Rs 5 trillion, on Friday. Advisor to Prime Minister on Finance, Dr. Miftah Ismail will present the budget. The budget will lend focus on improving economic growth, maintaining fiscal discipline, reducing non-development expenditures and boosting exports besides providing relief to the masses, promoting investment for job creation, treading the people’s friendly policies for over arching socio-economic prosperity. Main focus in the budget would be on infrastructure and human resource development while the government was likely to enhance allocations for social safety net for providing maximum relief to vulnerable segment of the society, the notification said.