The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Assembly on Thursday began a debate on the supplementary budget for the financial year 2015-16.
Opposition Leader Maulana Lutfur Rehman opened the debate. Rehman said the supplementary budget shows the incompetency of the government and is presented to meet deficiency in the budget. He was critical of the transfer of funds from one scheme to others.
He said the Billion Tsunami Tree Project was initiated without any prior planning and there is no mention about it in the budget allocations of the outgoing financial year. He said that the scheme was started with token fund and later Rs 3.7 billion were spent on it. He asked the government, “From which head the fund was diverted for the project?”
The opposition leader said that consecutive scandals are coming against the provincial government. The latest episode in this regard, he said, is the resignation of Pakhtunkhwa Energy Development Organisation (PEDO) chairman and members board of directors. He said the PEDO chairman has accused the provincial government for lack of planning.
He said that in the matter of Bank of Khyber, they had demanded the constitution of a judicial commission headed by the Peshawar High Court (PHC) chief justice and its presentation in the provincial assembly.
Criticising the propaganda campaign of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf government on social media, particularly Facebook, he said that enough has been done. The government should take some practical steps and build the capacity of the officials regarding planning to prevent the need of supplementary budget and should complete projects within the stipulated time period, he said.
He said that the government has failed in improving the health facilities, abolition of ‘Patwari culture’ and strengthening of economy.
Provincial Minister for Energy and Power Mohammad Atif Khan, in response, rejected the allegations regarding the former PEDO chairman Shakeel Durrani. He said that Durrani was having objections over the operation of the matters in corporate manner and micro-hydel projects.
He said that out of the total 356 micro-hydel power projects, 30 have already been completed providing cheap electricity to 350,000 people and completion of the remaining projects will provide cheap electricity to one million people.
The provincial minister was highly critical of the performance of the former PEDO chairman and said that Water and Power Development Authority, which was headed by him, is the top corrupt and mismanaged company of the country.
Parliamentary leader of Awami National Party in KP Assembly Sardar Hussain Babak termed the presentation of supplementary budget as constitutional but was critical of overspending in some sectors. He attributed the supplementary budget to poor planning of the government and demanded the presentation of the break-up of spending under it.
He demanded the government to tell about the cost of Billion Tsunami Tree Project and areas of plantation. He said that the project is a big scandal and media is covering it.
