ISLAMABAD: The session of the National Assembly to talk about the recently introduced mini-budget ended on Friday without a vote on the proposed changes.
If the house passes the important Finance (Supplementary) Bill, 2023, it will help bring back the International Monetary Fund (IMF) programme that was put on hold and keep Pakistan from not making its payments to international lenders.
The session will now start again at 5 p.m. on February 20. Today’s session was led by NA Speaker Raja Pervaiz Ashraf.
Finance Minister Ishaq Dar had officially unveiled a Rs170 billion mini-budget with some highly inflationary measures. However, commercial banks and traders were not taxed any more, which hurt the coalition government’s case for putting the burden on the sectors that could handle it the most.
The situation with commercial banks was more obvious because the finance minister had just said that they would have to pay high taxes as a punishment for “currency manipulation.” Last year, he said that the banks made about Rs50 billion in unneeded profits, which the government would get back by putting on more taxes.
Some of the measures in the bill, like putting a 10% advance income tax on public-private gatherings and events, have not brought in enough money in the past.
During the session, Qadir Mandokhail, an MNA for the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), said that the PPP had led a long march against inflation.
Mandokhail urged the government in power at the time to make life easier for the poor and raise taxes on luxury cars and homes instead. He added that taxes should also be put on WhatsApp and Twitter.
He also said that Shaukat Tareen, Jaafar Laghari, and Taimur Jhagra’s audio recordings showed that the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) planned to break the IMF agreements.
“The government should look out for the poor and make sure they don’t have to carry too much,” he said.
Sheikh Salahuddin, an MNA for the Mutahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P), said that Dar was “not serious” about the problems the country was facing.
He said that the MQM-P was working with the PDM to stop the country from going bankrupt and get it out of its economic crisis.
Salahuddin was upset that the value of the rupee had gone down and that the prices of gasoline, electricity, and gas had also gone up. “The public had already been hit with these bombs. Then, on February 15, our finance minister dropped another bomb,” he said.
Afzal Dhandla, an MNA from the PTI who didn’t agree with the majority, said that the finance minister had made electricity and gas too expensive for many people to pay for. He also said that everything was “uncontrollably expensive.”
“The finance minister is here to talk about the Kisan Package, but land is being sold because farmers haven’t paid back Rs300,000 in agricultural loans,” he said, asking how farmers could support the package.
NA Speaker Raja Pervez Ashraf said that the National Assembly had received the Senate’s suggestions on the Finance Amendment Bill 2023. He also said that members of NA could talk about the suggestions.
Agha Rafiullah, a member of parliament for the PPP, said that there was no doubt that the poor were under a lot of pressure and that both government and opposition members needed to go back to the people.
“You will get rid of inflation if you use the rate method,” he said, adding that markets should close at 6 p.m.
He asked the NA to ban cars with more than 1800 cc engines and told MNAs to take public transportation instead. Rafiullah also talked about how important it was for bureaucrats to have more than one car.
“Only the powerful have special rights; no one else does,” he said.
MNA Saira Bano from the Grand Democratic Alliance (GDA) also criticised the government for raising taxes and said that people couldn’t meet their needs because of inflation.
