The Pakistan Muslim League-N government has announced the formation of a new committee, aimed at reducing the size of government and also rationalise the expenditure on pensions and development, in a move that covers hardly 16% of this year’s budget and may not result into any major savings.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, however, notably excluded the defence budget and interest payments from the committee’s purview, which together account for around two-thirds of the federal budget.
Comprising four bureaucrats and three independent experts, including economist Dr Kaiser Bengali, a longstanding advocate for reducing non-combatant military spending and closure of cantonments, the committee has been given a one-week deadline to propose measures for cutting federal expenditure.
The committee has the mandate to review the pension schemes — an issue that is also now figuring on the agenda of the International Monetary Fund. The IMF has listed the wage and pension bill of the government as an outstanding issue for discussions during its March 14-18 review talks.
