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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.
