ISLAMABAD, Dec 30: President Gen Pervez Musharraf has assured that the provinces will be given full financial autonomy by substantially increasing their resources share through the National Finance Commission Award.
He was speaking to the members of provincial assemblies of the NWFP and Punjab separately at his camp office in Rawalpindi.
Provincial governors of the NWFP and Punjab, Lt-Gen (retired) Iftikhar Hussain Shah and Lt-Gen (retired) Khalid Maqbool, respectively, and chief ministers Akram Khan Durrani and Chaudhry Pervez Elahi were present during the meetings.
During his meeting with the MPAs from the NWFP, the president asked the MMA to continue its positive role in taking the country on the road to progress and development by discouraging the religious extremism.
He reiterated his resolve that there would be no rollback of country’s nuclear capability nor would there be any shift in Kashmir policy.
While the MPAs belonging to PPP-Sherpao and PML-Q along with the independents readily announced to extend vote of confidence to the president, the members belonging to the MMA told him that they would take any decision after consulting their leadership.
President Musharraf said he had taken decisions vis-a-vis the Legal Framework Order in the interest of democracy and Pakistan, and congratulated the government and the MMA for reaching an agreement on the issue with sagacity and understanding.
Referring to the vote of confidence, which the president is expected to seek from Parliament on Thursday, he asked the provincial legislators to exercise their vote in accordance with their conscience, keeping Pakistan’s interests supreme and after evaluating objectively his policies of the last four years.
President Musharraf dilated on some major regional and international issues and Pakistan’s position and efforts in resolving these as an important country of the world that was becoming increasingly interdependent with each passing day.
The president underlined the importance of local government system in stemming poverty through development at the grassroots level and assured that he would personally look into the complaints that the provincial governments were airing against district governments.
He reaffirmed that Pakistan would safeguard its national interests and not compromise on its nuclear deterrent. The president said his policies in the last four years had focused on economic turnaround as real sovereignty of a country lay in its economic strength.
