ISLAMABAD: Incumbent Pakistan Tehreek e Insaaf (PTI) government is directionless, incompetent, confused and lacks desired economic vision to steer the country from present acute macro-economic imbalance, said Senator Gen (Retd) Abdul Qayyum.
Opening discussion in the senate on behalf of the leader of opposition on Friday, the Senator said that the Government has not only totally failed to accomplish even a single financial target set by them but they have also been instrumental in accentuating prevailing financial woes due to wrong selection of financial team including finance minister, finance secretary, chairman FBR, chairman EPB and Governor SBP.
Confession of this blunder surfaced when they were all shown the door en-block after wasting valuable eight months in which essential financial decision making remained paralysed he said.
The Prime Minister himself, who was responsible for this disastrous selection, didn’t even apologise not to speak of his resignation, he added.
Senator said the government has lost confidence of the public because now economic management has been outsourced to institutions backed by forces who are not willing to tolerate nuclear Pakistan facilitating BRI through a strategic CPEC.
While quoting figures the Senator said GDP, FE Res , FDI , stock exchange, Revenue collection and per capita income have all unfortunately nosedived which has resulted in shrinking of economy from 320 billion dollars to approximately 280 billion dollars.
On the other hand there have been unprecedented escalations in inflation from 3.5 percent to about 7.2 percent and the Finance minister says it may go as high as 13 percent in the next year.
Few million people have lost their jobs and about 5 million people have further been pushed below the poverty line. Senator Qayyum said revenue collection target of Rs 5555 billion for next FY is unrealistic. Agriculture sector which contributes 20 percent in our GDP, only pays 0. 8 percent tax.
He said agricultural growth remained at 0.8 percent against 3.8 percent planned. Industrial growth was only 1.4 percent against 7.6 percent planned. Prices of medicine were up by 200 to 300 percent, during the outgoing fiscal. Defence budget has not only been frozen but also been cut by over Rs 100 billion when you take in to account inflation and devaluation of Pakistani currency. This is not at all a desirable step in the face of ever increasing threats both internal and external.
‘’We have to match our defence against likely aggression by our adversary planning to by high tech Rafael fighter jets , T90 main battle tanks , S400 most versatile ADS and modern ships and nuclear powered submarines’’ he added.
Senator Qayyum appreciated formulation of commission on debt issue which he said should cover PTI initial disastrous 9 months as well.
He criticized Prime Minister Khan’s dictatorial threatening tone and tenner while addressing the nation. He offered full cooperation to the government in clearing the economic mess and said that a team of PMLN advisers like Sartaj Aziz, Isaq Dar, Shahid Khaqan and Ahsan Iqbal could help government if PTI wanted.
