KARACHI, June 6: Opposition parties and the workers belonging to various labour organizations have expressed their sheer disappointment while commenting on the federal budget 2006-07 presented on Monday, most of them saying that fell far short of their expectations and lacked the measures pledged earlier by the government with regard to relief from unbearable price-hike, unemployment and standard of living.
Leaders of major political parties pointed out that in the budget, there was no mention of a source of revenue to offer subsidies on essential commodities. They also cast doubts over the government’s success in generating new employment opportunities in a situation where industrial and agricultural production was showing a sharp decline while imports of even consumer goods were on the rise.
Vice President of the PML-N and a former Sindh Governor Mamnoon Hussain said that the Economic Survey had clearly indicated that production of wheat, rice and sugarcane had come down.
He, however, welcomed a reduction in the tax on salaried class from by 10 per cent. He said that imposition of property tax needed to be clarified as it was not clear whether the book value or market value of a property would be regarded as the actual value.
Secretary General of the National Workers Party Yusuf Mastikhan remarked that the budget speech was more a political rhetoric than a technocrat’s document.
Rejecting the government’s claim that the sale of more TV sets and motorcycles was reflective of an improvement in the common man’s buying power, he said that on the contrary, concentration of wealth in a few hands had promoted the trend as people of the rich class were now having a TV set in each and every room of their palatial residences and providing motorcycles to their servants with a view to be served better.
Mr Mastikhan said that the increase of 45 per cent in the NFC Award for next five years indicated that it was a unitary form of government and not the federation.
He apprehended that allocations to federating units might again be based on the size of population. He said this would continue to aggravate the imbalance between the big province and the smaller ones.
He said that the government’s economic policy was self-contradictory as on the one hand, it vowed to do away with ‘begging’ and, one the other, expressed its intention to make heavy borrowing from financial institutions.
The Pakistan People’s Party termed the federal budget ‘anti-people’ and the increase in government employees’ salaries ‘ridiculous’, adds PPI.
Sindh chief of the party, Syed Qaim Ali Shah said that the budget offered no relief to common man while the government’s pledges of introducing measures against poverty, unemployment and price-hike proved nothing but tall claims and hollow slogans.
The budget was bound to push more and more people below the poverty line, he feared, indicating that over 50 per cent population of the country already lived blow the line.
He said the budget did not address any of the problems created by the privatisation process, price hike and unemployment.
Naib Amir of Jamaat-i-Islami and a central leader of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal Prof Ghafoor Ahmed said it was a ‘political speech’ rather than a budget speech and was aimed only at criticising the economic policies of the past governments and making tall hollow claims of economic progress and prosperity.
Complete failure of the present government’s economic policies is evident from the growing poverty, skyrocketing prices and rising graph of unemployment. He said the budget would only lead to an increased inflation and would make the common man’s life more miserable.
The All-Pakistan Trade Unions Organisation described the federal budget as ‘disappointing for workers and employees’.
He said that the budget was a jugglery of figures, adding that it offered nothing to the working class. He said it fell too short of the demands made by labour unions of the country that the minimum wage of unskilled workers be fixed at Rs7,000 per month and a 60 per cent raise be granted to junior-grade employees of government, semi-government, autonomous and semi- autonomous organisations.
