Wolesi Jirga again rejects 2021 budget

KABUL (Pajhwok): The Wolesi Jirga on Saturday once again rejected the 1400 solar year budget with a majority of votes over government’s failure to correct flaws and make changes to the draft.

The lower house had previously rejected the draft budget for 1400 solar year over elimination of 1,100 provincial projects and a surge in funds for government’s codes.

The government resent a revised version of the budget draft to the lower house a week ago after adding 20 billion afghanis to the accounts.

Speaker Mir RahmanRahmani said the government had not fixed 17 violations identified in the first draft and instead made two more violations in the second draft.

The speaker said the parliament’s recommendation of equalizing salaries of government employees had not been included in the budget draft.

Imbalance, inclusion of national food program (NFP) in the draft, loan and hefty budget for some departments were cited as reasons for not approving the budget draft.

The lower house had earlier rejected the National Food Program.

Mir Afghan Safi, who heads the house finance and budget commission, told today’s session that in addition to the 8,300 posts reduced in the previous budget plan, another 1,300 posts had been reduced.

He added that 4.3 billion afghanis for the presidential operational unit has been included in the budget plan, while the Wolesi Jirga has not yet approved the unit.

Finally, Mir Rahman Rahmani put the national budget to a vote, which was rejected by a majority of lawmakers, with only 15 votes coming in favor of the budget.

With a total outlay of 452.6 billion afghanis, 295.8 billion has been set aside as ordinary budget and over 156.8 billion afghanis as development budget.

hr/ma