Govt salaries to be paid despite 1403 budget approval pending

KABUL (TOLOnews): Based on the decree of the leader of the Islamic Emirate on the occasion of Eid al-Fitr, the advance payment of government employees’ salaries will be made without the approval of the 1403 (solar year) budget.
The officials of the caretaker government said that the draft budget for the year 1403 has been prepared and sent for endorsement to the leader of the Islamic Emirate. Ahmad Wali Haqmal, a spokesman for the Finance Ministry, said: “The fiscal year 1403 budget has not been endorsed yet, and Eid al-Fitr is approaching, the Ministry of Finance will implement the advance payment for the month of Hamal based on a special order from the leader of the Islamic Emirate.”
Meanwhile, a number of analysts said that for economic growth in the country, more attention needs to be paid to infrastructure projects in the current solar year budget. “The more we can allocate a budget for moving development and expansion projects in the country, or to allocate it to the government, undoubtedly, it can lead to economic growth,” Abdul Nasir Reshtia, an economic analyst, told TOLOnews.
“For a government, it is actually a guarantee of its movement next year. In this regard, I think we were observing a budgetary gap in the past year and these two or three years in Afghanistan, and this budgetary gap consists of a developmental or expansionary budget,” said Syed Masood, another economic analyst. This comes as since the return of the Islamic Emirate to power in the country, the budgets for the solar years 1401 and 1402 were covered by the country’s domestic revenues, and only in the year 1401, about 231 billion Afs were allocated for the regular and developmental budget.