Pakistan will destroy without taxing elites: Miftah Ismail

ISLAMABAD: Former finance minister Miftah Ismail said Sunday that the country will be destroyed without taxing the elites, ARY News reported.

While talking to the ARY News programme Sawal Yeh Hai, Miftah Ismail said that financial issues would not be resolved until elites go without taxes. He suggested the government to reduce expenses to improve the economy.

The former finance minister said that 40% inflation has not only destroyed the middle class people but it is now affected the upper class people.

He criticised that the leaders had not taken right decisions on the right time. “In 2017, the government increased the taxes on salaried persons by 15%, whereas, 261 billion are being taken from the salaried persons in terms of taxes today, whereas, only 61 billion of taxes are being received from big exporters.”

Ismail said that the government is not imposing property and agriculture taxes in provinces. He opposed the imposition of taxes on retailers and wholesalers.

Earlier, Miftah Ismail favoured the continuation of loadshedding in the summer season for conserving energy and the early closure of markets.

He also suggested to hike gas price in the winter season and shift the load to the electricity appliances. Ismail also favoured the closure of markets at 8pm under the energy conservation plan.

While talking to the ARY News programme ‘Khabar’, Miftah Ismail said that there is no other option left for Pakistan than continuing loadshedding in summer season to reduce expenditures on generating expensive electricity.

Regarding the relief for electricity consumers, the former finance minister said that the IMF would definitely reject the recommendation for relief to the 90% of power consumers using 400 units

Ismail favoured the caretaker government’s decision to provide relief to the power consumers using 200 units.

“The IMF demands the privatisation of the loss-making national entities. We should definitely privatise the loss-making entities.”