PESHAWAR, May 20: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf wants Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s budget for the next financial year a reflection of its election programme for which it is weighing its options, PTI’s provincial general secretary Shaukat Yousafzai told Dawn.

The party, Mr Yousafzai said when contacted on Monday, was not involved in the under progress budget making process. However, it has kept an eye over the process.

“We are trying to get involved (in the budget making process) to be able to reflect our programme in the next financial year’s provincial budget,” said Mr Yousafzai, a provincial assembly member-elect from Peshawar.The party appears to be double minded. According to its provincial office bearer, PTI is thinking to go with the under preparation provincial budget as an ‘interim plan’ and come up with its own plan a month or two after formally assuming the office.

“We have not taken oath (of office) as a result of which we can’t do much at this point of time,” said the PTI leader, adding “we are thinking to declare it (the budget being formulated at the provincial finance department) the interim provincial budget and present our own budget document after one or two months.”

The party, he added, was looking into the legal aspects of the matter and would decide its course accordingly.

The official budget making process is in full swing these days with the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa finance department working out revenue and expenditure estimates of the provincial government and the planning and development department preparing Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s development plan for the next financial year.

Though PTI claims that it is not involved in the budget making process, it is very much in the picture about what is happening at the provincial finance department’s end.Mr Yousafzai told Dawn that finance department authorities called on Pervez Khattak, PTI’s nominee for the office of provincial chief minister, on Monday and briefed him about the under preparation budget for the next financial year, explaining its salient features and finer details.

In a related development, according to official sources, PTI has conveyed its priorities to the finance department, explaining its position to the official functionaries at the highest departmental level about its take on matters covered under its election manifesto.

“A PTI delegation, involving some really bright men and women, called on the administrative secretary of the provincial finance department last week and informed him about the party’s priorities vis-à-vis setting up village councils to serve as a catalyst of change at the grassroots level,” said an official, requesting anonymity.

The party has promised, in its election manifesto, ‘direct funding for villages and municipalities to generate local economic activity across the length and breadth’ of area under its rule and ‘decentralise governance and empower communities for generating economic activity at the grassroots level.’

Akmal Minallah, a financial adviser to the government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, when contacted, said the foundations for empowering communities through village councils were present. “They (PTI) are going to follow the system’s spirit,” said Mr Minallah, an Islamabad-based public financial management consultant.

When asked about his presence at the PTI team’s meeting with the secretary of the finance department last week, Mr Minallah said “it (the meeting) would have happened, but I am not in the picture.”

He, however, said PTI’s programme was different from others (political parties) because it sought to take resources to the grassroots.

“The implementation of its programme would cause an immediate difference in the province,” said Mr Minallah. PTI’s programme would set in motion a strategic thinking as parliamentarians’ role in clearing and deciding development schemes would end.

He said the process to put in place the provincial government’s next financial year budget had completed. In the longer run, village based councils would hold the central stage in running governance. “Village councils will be provided with sufficient funds to meet their recurrent and development expenditure,” said the expert.

In this respect, PTI’s election manifesto talks about providing funds to the grassroots levels (village councils). It asks for setting up Provincial Finance Commission (PFC – which already exists in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in line with the previous local government system introduced in 2001) to ‘ensure equal/non-political distribution of funds to districts based on objective laid down criteria.’

The PTI’s manifesto goes one step ahead of distributing funds through PFC. It has promised to set up DFC (district finance commission) for every district to ensure equal distribution of funds to tehsils and then villages.

“Undoubtedly, challenges would be numerous, it will take time (to improve things),” said Mr Minallah.