Pakistan’s former finance minister and economist Hafeez A Pasha has said that Imran Khan-led Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) government presented wrong and exaggerated figures regarding the job creation and inflation in the country, reported local media.
Contradictory to the PTI’s claims that the country’s economic situation was good when its government was ousted, Pasha said that new employments numbers were exaggerated and the claims of the inflation rate decreasing were false, reported Geo News.
Only 2.5 million new jobs were created against the 5.5 million promised and the inflation rate was put at 7.12 per cent contrary to the actual 15 per cent, the media outlet quoted him as saying.
He further said that the unemployment rate reached 9 per cent in the PTI government and also contradicted the PTI’s claim of a 15 per cent increase in industrial growth saying it was in fact 1-2 per cent.
“There was an increase of 5.5 to 6 million in the labour force in the country during the three-and-a-half-year period of PTI government”, the media outlet quoted him as saying during one of its news programmes.
Pasha also said that the Pakistani rupees 10 relief in fuel prices was inappropriate and should be reversed. “It is not possible to go beyond that because of the high import price,” he said adding that if prices are hiked, it would increase the inflation further burdening the masses, according to the media outlet.
Meanwhile, Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has put an additional burden of around Rs 30 billion on the exchequer by turning down the oil and gas authority’s proposal to increase the fuel prices thus further deteriorating the economic situation of the country.
An amount of Rs 30 billion is already due on account of price differential claims due to keeping oil prices unchanged from April 1, 2022.
The government will be paying a price of Rs 60 billion to oil companies due to maintaining existing oil prices for the month of April.