PFC will be constituted within one week of election of mayors, chairmen: Sindh financ
 

KARACHI: Sindh Senior Finance Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah has assured the Sindh Assembly that Provincial Finance Commission (PFC) as per the law would be constituted within one week after election of mayors of cities and district council chairmen in the province for just distribution of resources between the provincial and local governments.

Sindh senior minister for finance stated this on Friday while delivering his winding up speech in Sindh Assembly during the general discussion in the House on new provincial budget for financial year 2016-17 that continued for the eighth day.

The provincial senior minister gave assurance regarding constitution of the PFC as a day earlier Leader of Opposition in the House, Khawaja Izharul Hassan, belonging to MQM in his winding speech complained against Sindh government for undue delay in constitution of the commission.

The Opposition leader had demanded constitution of the PFC for just and fair distribution of financial resources among districts of the province much on lines the centre used to divide resources among the provinces under the National Finance Commission’s award. Izharul Hassan had demanded that districts should be given 57 per cent share in provincial resources as per the formula of NFC award for distribution of resources among provinces.

The provincial finance minister said in his winding up speech that PFC would be constituted as per the Sindh Local Government Act-2013 and under provisions of the law, the PFC could **t be constituted till elections of mayors and district chairmen were **t held because as per the composition of the commission, mayor and chairmen of the district councils had to be its members after getting **minated by the government.

He said that at present, the Sindh government could **t constitute the PFC as there were ** elected mayors and district councils chairmen in the province. He said that Sindh government had **t caused any delay in election to the ******s of mayors, deputy mayors, and district councils chairmen as this was the prerogative of the Election Commission.

In his speech, provincial finance minister conceded that provincial government had been failing in making recoveries on two main accounts of direct taxes i.e. property tax and agriculture tax. He said that Rs2 billion annual collection of property tax from Karachi was way too less given the size, population, and well-settled status of the city. While the collection of property tax in Bangalore in India having less than 10 million population stood at Indian Rs24 billion.

He assured the House that immediately after passage of the provincial budget, a committee would be constituted having representation of the provincial government and opposition political parties for bringing reforms in collection and rates of agriculture income tax in the province.

He said that at the time of presentation of provincial budget on 11 June 2016, the Sindh government had to get Rs112 billion as per its share in federal divisible resources in passing financial year and **w the amount of dues payable by federal government had been reduced to Rs91 billion after release of a**ther installment of due funds by federal government. The finance minister said that Sindh government had **t been begging for getting its due share from federal resources rather it had been repeatedly approaching the federal authorities to get its due financial right from the centre, which the federal government had collected from the province in the form of federal taxes and kept with it as a trust.

He also assured the House that K-IV bulk water supply scheme for residents of Karachi would be completed in two years’ time after signing of the agreement with Frontier Works Organization while he also assured the concerned lawmakers that Sindh government would bear all the expenses of the K-IV project if the provincial government didn’t fulfill its commitment regarding equally sharing cost of the project.

The provincial minister also defended the Rs11 billion budget reserved for chief minister’s secretariat in new Sindh government budget saying that this budget allocation also contained Rs5 billion grant being provided to public sector universities for their **n-development expenditures while a helicopter had to be purchased in coming financial year to be used by the chief minister as the old helicopter had become outdated.

He informed the House that in the passing financial year, Rs162 billion had been allocated as provincial Annual Development Programme out of which Rs148 billion were released while Rs133 billion had been spent by different provincial government’s departments.

He said the Sindh government had the capacity to spend Rs225 billion it had allocated in the new provincial ADP in budget for upcoming financial year 2016-17.

Earlier in his winding up speech, Opposition leader Khawaja Izharul Hassan demanded to hold population census in the province on immediate basis under direct supervision of army whenever Pakistan Army would be able to spare its personnel to supervise the census drive in the province.

He also demanded that out of 11 members of Sindh Public Service Commission, at least four persons should be the representatives of urban population in the province while at least one member of the commission should be a woman.

He lamented the situation that ** new development scheme had been included in the new provincial budget for upgrading industrial zones in the city while similarly ** scheme had been proposed for progress of cottage industries and small traders.

He said that Sindh government had been bent upon collecting taxes from residents of urban areas of the province “in a manner to extort money from them while in return doing **thing for development of their residential, business, and workplace areas”.

He said that such a pathetic attitude on part of the provincial government would ** more be tolerable for residents of urban centres of the province. He said that Sindh government from year 2009 till 2016 had spent approximately Rs400 billion on law and order and security of the province but there had been ** improvement in capacity and performance of provincial police force.



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