The opposition legislators from southern districts staged protest in front of Speaker's dice against the ignoring of the region in the provincial budget for financial year 2019-20. The protesting opposition members were included Maulana Lutfur Rehman, Mahmood Ahmad Bettani, Mian Nisar Gul Kakakhel, Malik Zafar Azam (JUI-F) and Sher Azam Wazir and Ahmad Khan Kundi.
The protesting members after holding negotiations with Finance Minister Taimur Saleem Jhagra and Minister for Law and Parliamentary Affairs Sultan Mohammad Khan ended their protest. The house continued debate on the annual budget for financial year 2019-20 and several legislators from both opposition and treasury benches spoken on the budget.
Speaking on the budget, Maulana Lutfur Rehman of JUI-F said the KP government has presented a deficit budget of Rs85 billion. He alleged the PTI government moved to International Monitoring Funds (IMF) to prepare KP budget. He said the PTI lawmakers also annoyed and criticizing the budget. Lutfur Rehman said inflation would be increase from the existing 9 percent to 13 percent. He predicted dim chances of the spending of Rs 100 billion on merged districts.
Samar Bilour of ANP also termed the budget as deficit one, saying that out of the total Rs900 billion, Rs668 billion have been transferred from federal government. She said a lot of claims are being made about the projected 30,000 new jobs while hopes are not in the same as the PTI did not fulfill the other promises made with the people. Samar said the government has extended the retirement age to 63 years that would deprive youth of employment opportunities. She said minimum wage has been increased from 15000 to 17500 but prices of all essentials like petrol, gas, oil, ghee, and sugar etc have been multiplied.
She questioned the criteria for upgrading of 28000 schools. She said despite the claims of recruiting 21000 teachers, a lot of primary schools were still without sweeper.
Ahmad Kundi of PPP asked the government to review its policies. He said that there is nothing special for poor people in the budget. He said that tax to GDP ratio and exports were decreasing day by day.
Sardar Aurengzeb termed the budget of only five to six districts in which other districts have been ignored. He suggested increase in salaries in proportion to current ratio of inflation.
Responding the criticism of opposition, the Provincial Minister for Law and Parliamentary Affairs Sultan Muhammad urged opposition benches to criticise the govt but also acknowledge the presenting historic KP budget.
He said the opposition members are criticizing the budget for the sake of criticism adding that a record Rs 319 billion developmental budget has been presented that would stable the province economically in future.
He said no new tax has been imposed and by cutting salaries of the cabinet members would benefit the province economically.
Sultan Muhammad said the opposition was concerned over the situation after merger into KP, but today police and judicial system have been established and a separate budget is also been made to redress the grievances of tribesmen.
The education sector has been promoted while attendance ratio of teachers has also increased from 70 percent to 90 percent. He said the 63 years policy would create 50,000 vacancies in future.
Minister for Local Government Shahram Khan Tarakai said they will accept the suggestions of opposition, but, he said unfortunately they are not serious and their aim is merely criticism. He said 25000 teachers would be recruited across the province and about 6000 classrooms would be constructed in schools.