PTI’s Ali Zafar rejects budget, says it achieves neither growth nor public welfare

ISLAMABAD: PTI’s parliamentary leader in the Senate, Barrister Syed Ali Zafar, rejected the budget for 2026-27 as a document that achieves neither public welfare nor long-term growth, calling it a “budget of broken promises” built on “eleven deadly sins”. Speaking during the Senate debate on Tuesday, Zafar said every budget must have two objectives: trickle-down benefits for the poor and a credible strategy for economic growth and job creation. “Unfortunately, this budget fails to achieve either objective. It neither provides meaningful relief to the common citizen nor sets out a credible long-term plan for economic development and job creation,” he said. The senator listed 11 areas he said the government had ignored: long-term growth strategy; industrialisation policy; a plan for agriculture despite rising imports of cotton, wheat and sugar; a roadmap to boost exports; job creation strategy for youth; a plan to expand the IT sector; a solution to circular debt or a coherent energy policy; provision for dams and water conservation amid pressures on the Jhelum and Chenab rivers; response to climate change; strategy for population growth; and education. “Education is the foundation of progress and prosperity, yet the government appears to have neglected it entirely. It is as though the government does not wish to spread the light of knowledge among the people but is instead content to leave them in the darkness of ignorance,” he said. Criticising the government’s approach, he said: “For the last several years, it has looked for solutions only where it finds it easiest — through International Monetary Fund (IMF) programmes and by imposing additional taxes on the public.” He attributed the failure to incompetence rather than ill intent. “One conclusion is unavoidable: the government’s inability to solve the country’s fundamental problems stems from incompetence. “The persistent failure to identify and address the root causes reflects not merely poor policy choices but a