The PPP government has assured the PML-Q leadership that the party’s ministries of Health, and Labour and Manpower, would not be devolved in the near future. However, the Finance Division has not allocated funds for the two ministries in the 2011-12 budget keeping them in the category of ministries to be devolved which could become a cause of contention between the two parties.
Currently Riaz Hussain Pirzada of the PML-Q is holding the portfolio of the minister for health with his party’s Shahjahan Yousaf as his minister of state while Wajahat Hussain is federal minister for labour and manpower with Waqas Akram as the minister of state for the same ministry. A source in the PML-Q told Pakistan Today that President Asif Zardari and Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani had assured the Chaudhrys that the ministries of Health as well as Labour and Manpower would not be devolved for a year and half so that the PML-Q could be saved from embarrassment and discomfort.
On the other hand, a source in the Finance Ministry said the government had not allocated any kind of funds for the ministries already devolved like Population and Welfare, Education, Local Government and Rural Development, Tourism, Culture, Youth Affairs and for the ministries supposed to be devolved by June 30, 2011 such as Health, Food and Agriculture, Labour and Manpower and Environment. The source said budgetary allocations had only been made for selected projects and programmes of the devolved and would-be devolved ministries which had been placed under the government’s control permanently or for the time being.
“After June 30, 2011, the ministers for Health, Environment, Labour and Manpower etc will have no funds to even get the tanks of their vehicles filled,” he said. A PML-Q leader said the devolution of the ministries of Health and Labour and Manpower in the near future could cause friction between the PPP and the PML-Q. “The portfolios of Wajahat Hussain and Waqas Akram have already been changed from the Ministry of Overseas Pakistanis to Labour and Manpower to accommodate MQM’s Farooq Sattar and if they loose their positions again, it could lead to tension between the two parties,” said the source.
Asked to comment on the issue, Health Minister Riaz Hussain Pirzada said he did not know whether the Finance Ministry had allocated funds for the Health Ministry for FY2011-12 or not. Pirzada admitted that there was an understanding between the PPP and the PML-Q that the Health Ministry would not be devolved in the near future.
