PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Finance Department on Friday launched a consultative workshop for journalists on “Citizen Budget”, with the support of Sub-National Governance Programme, a project of Department for International Development (DFID), at Peshawar Press Club.
While briefing the participants, KP Finance Department Deputy Secretary Fahad Ikram Qazi said that the aim of the initiative was to inform journalists about the provincial budget and its expenditure by the government.
He further said that that the initiative had started from Peshawar Press Club and would later be expanded to academic institutions, including universities and colleges, to enable the public and students to understand the budget from an informed perspective.
Qazi informed that the provincial finance department had made all the financing online and people could get information about the budget through the finance department’s website. The KP government had finally achieved its target of involving the public in the accountability process, he added.
On the occasion, Sub-National Governance Programme team leader Khalid Khan said that the information initiative regarding the budget was the first of its kind initiative in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, aimed at creating awareness about budget among the general population.
He further said that already they had launched a booklet on the subject of citizen budget in Urdu to help the common people better understand the complexities of the entire budgeting process. A budget was prepared by the government through taxes collected from common citizens, and it was the right of the public to know where their money was being spent, he added.
Khalid Khan also said that such initiatives would be promoted on the community level as well in order to make elected representatives accountable in front of their voters.