'Public money belongs to the people': KP governor says his observations on law to raise MPAs’ privileges 'on record'

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Governor Faisal Karim Kundi on Friday said that his observations regarding a new law expanding provincial assembly members’ powers and immunities were on record, adding that “public money belongs to the people”.

The KP Assembly pass­ed the KP Provincial Assembly (Powers, Immu­nities and Privileges) Act, 2026, on April 30. On the same day, it also passed two other laws: the KP Province Speaker and Deputy Speaker (Powers, Immunities and Privil­eges) Act, 2026, and the KP Province (Salaries and Allowances of Mem­bers) Act, 2026. Kundi had assen­ted to the laws on May 6.

The privileges law expands provincial assembly members’ powers and immunities, including the issuance of lifetime official passports to them and their spouses, blanket immunity from preventive detention, and entitlement to licences for up to eight non-prohibited-bore weapons.

In a statement posted on X on Friday, the governor said his observations had been “on record since May” and that he had made it clear that “no law should become a means of expanding privileges when the people of Pakistan, especially the people of KP, were being asked to endure austerity and economic hardship.”

He said he had urged that the law be implemented “in the true spirit of fiscal discipline and prudent use of public resources”, adding that “a government that speaks of financial constraints cannot, in the same breath, legislate greater privileges for those in power”.

“My position was clear then, and it remains unchanged today: public money belongs to the people, not to the perks of those who govern them,” Kundi said.

In a copy of his observations published with the post, he recommended that the provincial assembly’s finance committee implement the spirit of the prime minister’s 14-point austerity measures, including expenditure cuts, fuel rationing and the elimination of unnecessary privileges.

He also suggested that the committee reconsider the law to operationalise those principles “in true letter and spirit”.

In the Act, the government has repealed the 1988 law on the same subject. Although most provisions of the repealed law have been retained in the new legislation, certain changes have been made to expand the privileges of assembly members.

The 1988 law provided that members could not be preventively detained during the period commencing 14 days before the start of an assembly session and ending 14 days after its conclusion. It also barred preventive detention during the period commencing seven days before the meeting of a committee of which the member was a part and ending seven days after the meeting concluded.

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