LAHORE: Caretaker Finance Minister of Punjab Zia Haider Rizvi has said theinterim government has inherited outstanding payments of Rs71 billion underdifferent heads and its first priority is to timely release salaries ofgovernment employees.
“Punjab government is facing cash flow issues due to various reasons,” saidRizvi in a statement on Thursday. A major reason behind that was slowertransfer of provincial share in the National Finance Commission (NFC) awardby the federal government.
Apart from the NFC award, some shortfall in the Punjab Revenue Authority’stax collection, due to the Supreme Court order that suspended taxcollection on telecommunication services, is another factor behind theliquidity crunch.
“In view of this, the Finance Department has anticipated that somecheques/instruments will remain unpaid this year,” he said.
The caretaker chief minister has directed the Finance Department to accordfirst priority to the payment of salaries as per directives of the SupremeCourt.
Second priority is being given to claims of less than Rs5 million tofacilitate maximum number of people with comparatively slower cash flowwhereas third priority is being given to payments of over Rs5 million.
“The government of Punjab had issued an advice to the State Bank ofPakistan for making payments in accordance with the above priorities andinstructing all banks concerned to stay open on June 30,” he said.
Moreover, as per the chief minister’s directives, Rizvi also wrote a letterto the federal finance minister seeking the release of withheld share ofPunjab and it was also reiterated in a meeting with the finance czar inIslamabad.
A number of cheques and instruments issued by various departments ororganisations of the Punjab government and the payments made on June 30,2018 could not be cleared because of various reasons.