ISLAMABAD, May 26: President Pervez Musharraf is expected to give fresh instructions on Thursday to the finance ministry to find out a reasonable way out of the National Finance Commission impasse.
Sources told Dawn on Wednesday, Finance Minister Shaukat Aziz and his team will be holding a meeting with the president on Thursday to brief him on the latest situation on the NFC award and seek fresh instructions.
These sources said the finance minister was in touch with the provincial governments and a date for holding another round of informal or formal NFC meeting would be finalized following his briefing to President Musharraf.
The total size of the divisible pool (net) is estimated for 2004-05 (first year of the NFC) by the finance ministry and the Auditor General of Pakistan at Rs543.28 billion. This would increase to Rs894.43 billion by the year 2008-09 (the fifth and final year of NFC).
A new formula is floating around that suggests a structured and step-by-step approach to increase the provincial share in the divisible pool. Under this formula, half a percentage point could be increased every year in a way that provinces' share in the divisible pool is increased to 50 per cent by the year 2008-09.
But the provinces disapprove this approach, saying it simply represents an escalation cost and their share be structured in a way that it touches 52.5 per cent by the year 2008-09.
An NFC member told Dawn that he had a discussion with Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali in Saudi Arabia that he should take a step ahead of he had announced on Sunday.
He said the prime minister was requested to ensure a Rs5 billion subvention to the NWFP and Balochistan to meet their additional requirements and the issue would stand resolved. He said all the parties had almost agreed to the formula presented by the prime minister and even congratulated each other but then it just fizzled out.
The sources said the president was likely to direct Mr Aziz to give about a billion or two more to go up to 48 per cent (Rs260.77 billion) share to the provinces as a "goodwill gesture from the federation" to ensure that a consensus was achieved before the budget.
