Islamabad:
Pakistan Tehreek-E-Insaf (PTI) burst the government’s financial investigation on Monday and accused it of mistakenly represented indicators and delivered a budget-shaped by the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Head of Opposition Omar Ayub, PTI Central Information Secretary Sheikh Waqas Akram and PTI MNA Mubeen Arif Jutt held a joint press conference at Khyber Pakhtunkhwa House.
With reference to media reports, the opposition leaders claimed that the number of people living below the poverty line has risen to 45 percent, up from 35 percent, by approx. 30 million people now classified as poor.
“All this budget has been handed over by the IMF.
“Pakistan’s purchasing power is collapsed. By 2022, someone earning RS50,000 is now effective RS22,000.”
Ayub also claimed that wheat prices have risen by 50 percent over the past three years, referring to comparisons from the Bureau of Statistics’ two-year data set. “Poverty has reached 44.7 percent. Planning budget worth 80 percent remained unused and lapsed.”
“And we have to ask: Does the number of four -legged donkeys have risen or the two -legged?”
Sheikh Waqa’s Acram paralyzed government performance.
He said the poor have been rattled to their bones and added that reports reveal that poverty has jumped from 35 to 45 percent. “There was no earthquake or natural disaster in these three years that could explain the collapse of agriculture, and yet it has refueled.”
He noted that 37 percent of the population is attached to farming and “their backs have been broken”.
Waqas also remembered for a moment from an NFC meeting in which Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s provincial finance minister reportedly asked how electricity growth was calculated. “The answer? They count electricity generated from solar panels installed on people’s roof that the government has no control over.”
“Inflation is not relieved. For the first time, 30 percent of livestock remained unsold under Eid. In the last three years, three million people have left the country. When we left the government, the debt of RS43,500 billion has been added since then another RS31,500 billion has been laid.”
“This budget is not the government, it is dictated by the IMF. This economic study is form 47, not reality.”
PTI MNA MUBEEN ARIF JUTT, who also spoke in the press, referred to the comment from the Minister of Finance, who suggests that the policy rate should be halved. “If the government is serious about resuscitation, it must take responsibility instead of relying on window dressing,” he said.
