Parliament approves fiscal year’s budget, Ghani praises the move

The Afghan parliament on Monday approved the current fiscal year’s budget with the majority of votes after weeks of tensions between the two-state branches over the document.

Following the national fiscal year budget approval the Presidential Palace issued a statement saying that President Ghani thanked members of the House of Representatives for approving the budget for the 1400 solar fiscal year.

“The President praised the decision, approving the national budget for the solar year 1400 in the national interest, and called it important for the timely implementation of the basic plans and programs of the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, especially development projects throughout the country,” read the statement.

“Increasing the salaries of employees, accommodating development projects, the relative balance of money in special codes, reducing unnecessary spending, preventing the loss of people’s money are important chapters of this success,” said Mir Rahman Rahmani, speaker of the house.

The fiscal year began on December 21, 2020, and the parliament rejected the budget draft twice.

On Sunday, lawmakers and the Finance Ministry officials agreed on almost all 19 disputed points, but they still have yet to agree on the allocation of the budget for the High Council for National Reconciliation as well as over the reduction in the number of development projects, MPs said.

Both sides also disagreed on a 15 million AFN allocation for the Afghanistan Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority, but the issue was solved when the fund was removed from the third budget draft, according to lawmakers.

In the third and latest draft, 105 million AFN ($1.3 million) have been shifted to the regular budget from the development budget.

Meanwhile, MPs did not approve the budget for a number of departments that did not receive a vote by the parliament, such as the High Council for National Reconciliation, and placed the budget of the Council under the budget of the Presidential administration office.

Some MPs still believe that no changes have been brought in the budget and that “everything (recent disputes) was just a show and was for personal interests.”

The estimated budget for the fiscal year 1400 is over 473 billion AFN (nearly $6 billion), including 311 billion AFN ($4 billion) for the regular budget and 162 billion AFN ($2 billion) for the development budget.