ISLAMABAD:
The coalition government has so far spent hardly Rs424 billion or less than 40% of the annual downward revised development budget, impacting construction work and cash flows of hundreds of projects, including schemes of the provinces and merged districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
The only exceptions to lower spending were the projects related to parliamentarians, Azad Jammu & Kashmir, Gilgit-Baltistan and Space & Upper Atmosphere Research Commission (Suparco), showed the official documents.
The official data of the Planning Commission showed that from July through the middle of April (nine and half months), the development expenditures amounted to Rs424 billion or 39% of the annual budget. The downward revised Public Sector Development Programme is worth Rs1.1 trillion, which is spread over 1,071 projects.
Under the Finance Ministry’s release strategy, 60% of the annual budget can be spent during the first nine months of this fiscal year. But the spending remained below this threshold by at least Rs260 billion. This is despite the fact that the Planning Commission had authorized Rs890 billion spending during this period but the actual expenditures were far lower than the budget spending strategy and the authorized spending.
When contacted, the Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal said that compared to the last year, the spending during the nine-month period was still higher by Rs102 billion. He said that the monthly spending in March this year was also higher by Rs27 billion.
However, the details showed that despite being higher than last year’s spending; the overall situation was not good, which impacted many projects.
The official documents showed that the already approved Rs1.1 trillion budget is not adequately spent on the development schemes.
According to these documents, the government had allocated Rs276.5 billion for projects in provinces, special areas and merged districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. But the actual spending till April 15th remained at Rs98.5 billion or 36% of the annual allocation.
Within this spending, an amount of Rs56.6 billion was spent on AJK and GB projects, which was equal to 76% of the annual budget and higher than the ceiling.
But on the merged districts of KP only Rs15.8 billion or 23% of its Rs70 billion allocation was spent. These merged districts are adversely affected by the terror attacks and are under-developed but yet it could not get the attention of the Prime Minister.
For the provincial projects, Rs132 billion have been allocated but the spending remains at just Rs26 billion or 20% of the annual allocation.
The Planning Ministry did not respond to a question about the annual allocations for Balochistan projects and the actual spending during the first nine and half months of this fiscal year.
But details showed that there were 200 federally-funded projects going on in Balochistan having a total cost of Rs1.4 trillion. These projects need little over Rs1 trillion more for completion and the government has already allocated Rs130 billion for this fiscal year.
An official of the Planning Commission said that the finance ministry was not releasing the funds despite authorization due to its International Monetary Fund related commitments. But such constraints did not impact spending on the parliamentarians’ small schemes.
As against the annual allocation of Rs50 billion, Rs35 billion or 69% of the annual budget has already been spent on the parliamentarians’ schemes in this fiscal year.
The Water Resource Ministry’s annual budget was Rs170 billion and so far Rs71 billion or 42% of the annual allocation is spent. The Water Resources Ministry has already requested additional Rs60 billion cover for spending the foreign loans on its schemes. But the Planning Commission has so far not been able to provide the cover.
The National Highway Authority’s annual budget is Rs161 billion but spending remains at only Rs54 billion or little over one-third of the annual allocation. The Balochistan’s project that will get petroleum levy funding is also under the purview of the NHA.
The Power Davison’s annual budget is Rs95 billion but the spending is just Rs51 billion or little over half of the annual allocation.
