PESHAWAR: PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan said on Friday that the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa budget was not being passed at the federal government’s request, but as the province’s constitutional and legal responsibility.
Speaking to Geo News, Gohar said passing the budget was a provincial matter itself and had no connection with the federal government. He added that the provincial budget would be passed and that all lawmakers, including Ali Amin Gandapur, would attend the assembly session.
It may be noted that the provincial government is scheduled to present its budget for the fiscal year 2026-27 at 2pm today.
Meanwhile, senior PTI leader Shaukat Yousafzai said Chief Minister Sohail Afridi had initially wanted to delay the budget until a meeting with the PTI founder took place.
He said one proposal was to present a three-month budget if legal complications became unavoidable, but legal experts advised that such a move would halt development work across the province and would only cover matters such as salaries and pensions.
Yousafzai said the party ultimately recommended presenting the full budget to avoid harming the province and to ensure development projects continued. He said the decision was taken in the broader public interest and confirmed that the budget would be presented today.
Addressing reports of internal differences, he said members with reservations were not rebelling against the party and remained committed to PTI. He said all lawmakers would attend the assembly session, express their concerns in speeches and ultimately vote in favour of the party’s position.
He also denied that any back-channel contacts were taking place and said the people of the province had the right to expect consultation with their leader.
Yousafzai argued there was no legal obstacle to meetings with the PTI founder and claimed such meetings were being denied for political reasons.
According to provincial government sources, the proposed budget is estimated at more than Rs2.170 trillion. It includes a development programme worth over Rs519 billion, with Rs150 billion from international donor agencies earmarked for development projects. The budget also proposes Rs55 billion for local governments, a 7% increase in salaries and pensions for government employees and the merger of the 2022 and 2025 ad hoc relief allowances.
Sources further said the province expects to receive Rs1.443 trillion from the federal government and around Rs105 billion in net hydel profit, while revenue from its own resources is estimated at Rs180 billion. More than 900 new development schemes have also been proposed.
Yousafzai, however, said the overall budget size was expected to be around Rs2.2 trillion and proposed allocating Rs235 billion for development works. He said the provincial cabinet was finalising salary increases with an effort to ensure minimum pay was sufficient for people to meet their basic needs, particularly at a time when inflation had reached very high levels and the federal government had offered little relief.
He said no new taxes were being imposed in the budget and that several taxes were instead being reduced to ease the burden on the public, describing the budget as tax-free. He also said the provincial government was not including grant-in-aid payments in the budget as a form of protest and alleged that the federal government had not provided the province with its due financial share.
Yousafzai added that the chief minister and his team had tried to ensure the budget did not place additional pressure on the public. He said the budget would be realistic and deficit-based rather than surplus or balanced, with the shortfall expected to be around Rs50 billion and spending aligned with the funds actually received from the federal government.
He said education and health remained key priorities, while tourism, mines and minerals, water resources and electricity generation offered opportunities to make the province more self-reliant. He added that work was continuing on small and large power projects and that the provincial government was paying special attention to tourism.
Yousafzai also criticised the federal government for what he described as a lack of cooperation, claiming work on National Highway Authority roads was not progressing and urging Islamabad to support the province’s development efforts.
Separately, former provincial assembly speaker and PTI MPA Mushtaq Ghani told Geo News that a meeting of 35 like-minded PTI lawmakers would be held at 2pm to determine their final strategy on the budget.
He said the chief minister had earlier maintained that the budget would not be presented before a meeting with the PTI founder but was now reversing that position.
Ghani questioned how presenting the budget would put pressure on the federal government and claimed no meaningful pressure was being exerted to secure meetings with the PTI founder.
