Daily Times

Federal Minister for Planning, Development and Special Initiatives, Prof Ahsan Iqbal said on Thursday that the volume of the Public Sector Development Program (PSDP) is likely upto Rs 700 billion in Budget (2022-23), which will increase more development opportunities in the country.

At the same time, he said that efforts will be made to raise upto Rs 200 billion more through public-private partnership, which will accelerate development projects.

Federal Minister for Planning, Development and Special Initiatives, Prof. Ahsan Iqbal expressed these views while addressing a press conference here at the Press and Information Department. He said that in total, 44 percent of PSDP projects are provincial projects and the remaining 46 percent are federal projects,”We have ample opportunities.” Ashan said, “We had taken PSDP to Rs.1000 billion during the previous tenure of the PML-N government. However, former Pakistan Tehrek-e-Insaf government had brought to Rs. 500 billion, which till now it wanted to reach Rs. 2000 billion.” He said the government will work mostly on youth issues and water scarcity and other issues, which are very important for the sustainable economic development of the country.

The minister said that there was no work on the projects of China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) in the previous regime, but only a few of these projects started during our tenure. He said that work on 9 Special Economic Zones (SEZs) of CPEC was to be completed by 2020 but not a single SEZ was completed by the PTI government.

Ahsan said that Chinese industrial relocation was possible only with the completion of these 9 CPEC SEZs, which did not happen. He said that the Chinese government was more interested in the Hattar Special Economic Zone (SEZ) project, but the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) KPK provincial government decided to transfer the project to Rashakai SEZ.

“Now the government is trying to include Hattar SEz also.” The minister said that the PML- N government strongly condemns the anti-Pakistan statement of former Prime Minister Imran Khan. He said that the security of the country is the first responsibility of the state in which no negligence will be tolerated.

He said no one would be allowed to speak on other sensitive issues, including the country’s nuclear programme. He said that the former Prime Minister Imran Khan should not be embarrassed to say such things as he has been ousted from the government and he should show political seriousness. He said that in the past, the government of PTI had led the country towards an economic crisis which the present government was trying to rectify.