Former prime minister and Chairman Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf Imran Khan has rejected the 2022-23 federal budget, claiming that it is based on ‘unrealistic’ assumptions.

Hours ago, however, finance minister Miftah Ismail had blamed the PTI government for the country’s economic woes. It is increasingly clear that the present government has elected to play the blame game but that isn’t very constructive. In actuality, however, the problems stem from decades of poor economic management by successive governments who have failed to tackle endemic corruption and widespread tax avoidance. How unfortunate it is that the budget had to earmark 3.95 trillion rupees just to service the country’s whopping debt of $128 billion. There appears to be no way out as country’s economic impasse deepens.

Mufti Aijaz (Karachi)

Copyright Business Recorder, 2022