Budget must revolve around job creation: Altaf Shakoor

F.P. Report
KARACHI: Pasban Democratic Party (PDP) Chairman Altaf Shakoor here Sunday said that the coming budget must revolve around job creation to boost the economy by utilising every member of our youth.
He said the successive governments in Pakistan due to the IMF slavery have given budgets with a focus of getting more loans and thus diverting our resources to pay these loans and their killing interest. He said this debt trap has only served the interests of the international lending institutions and their hitmen sitting in every major political party and institution in Pakistan. He said these hitmen-made budgets have never served the interests of the nation and the country and especially its youths; resultantly the country faces an alarming ratio of joblessness. He said high joblessness and higher food inflation is a sure way to poverty and deprivation, which is the real objective of the debt trap.
Altaf Shakoor said all idle government land should be given free of cost to millions of our jobless youths.
He said cultivation of these barren lands would not only fight the joblessness but also tame unbridled food inflation in Pakistan. He said our agricultural sector needs drastic changes to utilize every inch of our fertile lands. He said in the coming budget agriculture reforms and policy of allotting free of cost government lands should be given a priority. Altaf Shakoor demanded overhauling our education system and making vocational training part of all educational certificates, qualifications and degrees. He said students should be trained in a practical environment instead of teaching them old and impractical textbooks. He said technical and vocational colleges and universities should be set in every district of Pakistan. He said ample funds should be allocated in the budget in this regard.
Altaf Shakoor asked to focus on labour-intensive industry instead of tech-intensive industry to absorb the millions of Pakistani jobless youths. He said again the agricultural sector provides unlimited capacity for new job creation in the farming sector. He said with the use of solar energy saline water in deserts, creeks and coastal areas could be easily treated and used for farming. He said when land, water and sunshine is available abundantly why the government avoids using them for creating millions of new jobs with any foreign loans or borrowed technologies.
He appealed to the budget makers at the federal, provincial and local government levels to make creating new job openings their utmost priority while drafting their respective budgets for the coming fiscal.