ISLAMABAD: Flouting Supreme Court’s decision barring discretionary spending, the incumbent government has provided over Rs94b of funds to lawmakers to win elections in more than 100 constituencies during polls in 2018.
It is alleged that only a few people took this decision to provide funds over Rs94b, which included Minister for Parliamentary Affairs and Capt (retd) Safdar, who is also the son-in law of ex-PM Nawaz Sharif.
According to sources, the allocation of funding in some cases ran into billions of rupees, reported a local newspaper. The Cabinet division, Planning Ministry are said to be providing the support and the approval to disburse funds is being carried out by Finance Ministry.
Over Rs55b is said to have been released in last nine months, documents and government official revealed. Funds allocated for other projects were reduced and redirected to other parliamentarian’s projects worth Rs26.4b.
Incumbent Finance Minister Ishaq Dar was not in favour of releasing funds at a fast speed after exit of ex-PM Nawaz Sharif, but was convinced so by Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi during a cabinet meeting in August, sources said. The outcome of this meeting resulted in the release of Rs32.6b funds in a span of a few days.
These funds were disbursed under PM’s programme for achieving Sustainable Development Goals which was given go-ahead by federal cabinet last year. The SDG program’s main goal is to improve social indicators.
Over Rs94b is said to have been released since 2015 and according to Dr Ikramul Haq, advocate of apex court the SDG program is a cover aimed at fooling the Supreme Court regarding discretionary spending.
During financial year 2015-16, Rs20b had been assigned for SDG’s programme and actual spending crossed over Rs20.9b. During second week of June last year, Rs900m had been given, the documents disclosed.
In 2016-17, Rs20b were assigned for parliamentarian schemes, but actual disbursements stood at Rs42.5b. Confirming the release of Rs42.5b funds, the Ministry of Finance said the Planning Ministry had squeezed out additional money of Rs22.b by diverting funds from other development schemes.
Finance ministry outright denied the release of additional funds through a supplementary budget. Although this flouts SC’s judgement, but Planning Ministry Spokesman Asim Niazi said real spending for SDGs programme under PSDP stood at Rs27.5b during 2016-17. He added only Rs7.5b had been diverted from another federal project by Planning Ministry.
An official of planning ministry alleged the remaining Rs15b funds were sanctioned by the Finance Ministry.
During current financial year 2017-18, parliament gave go-ahead for Rs30b allocation for SDGs programme, but Finance Ministry had sanctioned Rs32.67b till September 2017. Over Rs2.67b was given via supplementary budget, finance ministry confirmed.
