QUETTA: Balochistan Chief Minister Jam Kamal Khan Alyani has rejected criticism of opposition parties over the next year’s budget and said people of the province would decide about it.

Winding up the budget debate in the provincial assembly on Monday evening, he said his government believed in equal development of the province and not a single area of Balochistan had been ignored in the Public Sector development Programme.

Enough funds had been allocated for ongoing and new development schemes. The government had initiated development schemes in all districts at a cost of over Rs70 billion, he added.

The chief minister said that after coming to power in 2018, the coalition government faced a lot of issues and financial difficulties, but with the cooperation of coalition parties it improved law order, governance, monitoring system and functioning of the institutions.

He said his government had passed legislation for securing resources and coasts of Balochistan and banned the sale of government and private land to foreign companies on ownership basis. The foreign companies could now acquire land on lease.

Mr Alyani said resources of the province had been protected under the mineral policy, 2019. A file-tracking system had been introduced to monitor progress of government departments, he added.

He said his cabinet held 102 meetings during the past two years. It prepared the Gwadar master plan and the project had been extended to 30 districts, including Quetta.

Published in Dawn, June 30th, 2020