Charter of Economy, okay!: But first CoD be extended to all political parties, says Saad

ISLAMABAD: The fire-brand PML-N leader Khawaja Saad Rafique said the Charter of Economy should be signed but first the Charter of Democracy be extended to all the political parties.

“But it is not possible at a time we follow undemocratic behaviour and politics of revenge and then talk about Charter of Economy,” he said, adding there was need to bring down the political temperature in the country in order to run the country. He pointed out that it is said that Imran Khan should not be called as the selected Prime Minister and said an elected prime minister would not give NRO or talk about this.

Speaking on the budget, the PML-N leader said the federal budget had made the salaried class to cry while it would also play with the real estate business. He said the powers being given to the income tax officers to raid houses would have highly horrible effects across. “You are giving powers to income tax officers to enter houses of people,” he said. He said bringing down the tax net to Rs600,000 per year was also a brutal act, saying that no tax could be collected while taking the tax slab t0 35%. “How a government will collect Rs5500 billion when it failed to achieve target of Rs4000 billion,” he said, adding the government also impose cuts on the health and education budgets. He said it was painful to see members sitting in this House defending wrong doings and false claims of their leaders.

The PML-N parliamentarian said the incumbent government would not be able to complete two what to talk about five years if it continued with its politics of revenge and grilling opponents. “We should make an end to politics of revenge and grilling opponents if we want to take forward the country,” he said. He prayed to Almighty Allah that the PTI leaders do face the mal-treatment which the PPP and PML-N leaders had faced and were facing. “I know that I am being grilled because of my speeches,” he said.

Speaking on a point of personal on speech of the Fawad Chaudhry, said what the PTI government had done with the minister was not done by his opponents.

On issue of Charter of Economy, he said it was a good initiative but it should be signed not between the government and opposition but be reached between the political parties as done in Bangladesh. However, he said firstly a consensus should be reached on budget and to some extent convergence and confluence is seen on budgetary then it would be good beginning to the Charter of Economy. He said the government should have agreed on the Charter of Economy before announcing the federal budget, saying the opposition parties were also not agreed with the tax regime and financial discipline which the government wanted to bring about. “Let us first reach a meeting point on budgetary measures and other economic issue then we can talk about any Charter of Economy,” he said, adding the PML-N was still in favour of Charter of Economy as Nawaz Sharif in the past had talked about the issue.

As some members from the treasury benches made some remarks during his speech, Khawaja Asif said they are just justifying their presence in the House.