Opposition lawmakers lambaste government's 'double standards

The opposition lawmakers in the Senate on Friday lambasted the government's 'double standards', saying the Senate is being deprived of financial powers while an unelected man was handpicked at the eleventh hour as a federal finance minister to present the budget 2018-19.
Before laying a copy of the Financial Bill 2018-19 in the Senate by newly handpicked Finance Minister Dr Miftah Ismail, who is neither a member of the Senate nor National Assembly, former Chairman Senate Raza Rabbani said presentation of a budget by an unelected member of either house is in no way justified.
He said the new budget a step towards 'financial terrorism and financial fascism,' adding the Senate is not being given financial powers under the pretext that its members are not directly elected by public while an unelected member was made finance minister hardly a few hours before the presentation of new budget.
"The financial fascism is at its height as the budget is being presented by a man who is a member of neither the National Assembly nor the Senate," he lamented. The former chairman Senate came down hard on President of Pakistan Mamnoon Hussain for administering oath to a person [Dr Miftah] who is not an elected member of either house. "The President should have refused to administer oath to a person who is not an elected member," he contended.
He questioned if an unelected man can present a budget, why the Upper House of the Parliament cannot be given financial powers. He said that despite walkout by chief ministers of the three smaller provinces - Sindh, Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa - from a meeting of National Economic Council, the budget is presented.
He said the three chief ministers staged walkout while CM Punjab was not present in the meeting, which means the quorum was not complete hence the meeting should never took place, as the council had a total of eight members. Taking the floor, Opposition Leader in Senate Sherry Rehman said the PML-N government is set to leave with huge debt of $22 billion which is a record loan left by any outgoing government is history of the country. "You've no right to present the sixth budget...what's this jugglery? We are people's representatives and we completely reject this budget and have already given our vote of no confidence against it," she added.
However, amid uproar and protest by combined opposition, the government laid a copy of Finance Bill, 2018, containing annual budget statement, in the Senate. The copy of the bill was laid by Dr Miftah Ismail, Minister for Finance, Revenue and Economic Affairs.
The chairman Senate directed the members of the House to submit their budgetary proposals by April 30 after which no proposal will be entertained.
Earlier, the House turned into a fish market when the chairman Senate 'bulldozed' reports of the standing committee on finance, economic affairs and revenue on the recently issued controversial ordinances despite clear majority of opposition members in the House. Sanjrani, who was elected as chairman Senate with the support of opposition parties particularly Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), openly ignored the objection raised by the opposition benches and adopted the bills one by one.
This promoted the combined opposition to stage walkout from the House after the chairman did not pay any heed to their objections who wanted headcount for adoption of the bills, but Sanjarani kept adopting all the four reports of the committee in one go. Senator Mohsim Aziz of PTI said the committee did not even include his dissenting notes with the bill. Senator Sadia Abbasi of ruling PML-N also complained that she had made some recommendations but they were not incorporated. The House adopted the reports of following bills, which were presented by the Senator Musadaq Malik on behalf of committee chairman Senator Farooq H Naek who remained conspicuously missing from the House. The Foreign Assets (Declaration and Repatriation) Bill, 2018; the Voluntary Declaration of Domestic Assets Bill, 2018; the Income Tax (Amendment) Bill, 2018 and the Protection of Economic Reforms (Amendment) Bill, 2018.