Ministry of Finance held a preparatory session on the National Finance Commission (NFC) award earlier this month followed by concerns voiced by the leadership of the Pakistan Peoples’ Party (PPP) that amendments must be within the parameters contained in Article 160 3 (A) of the Constitution, specifically that “the share of the provinces in each award of the NFC shall not be less than the share given to the provinces in the previous award.”

NFC was established in 1974 and given that Article 160 stipulates that the President constitute an NFC (consisting of the Minister of Finance of the Federal Government, the Ministers of Finance of the Provincial Governments, and such other persons as may be appointed by the President after consultation with the Governors of the Provinces at intervals) not exceeding five years to determine the resource sharing formula there ought to have been ten awards to date.

There are seven NFC awards with only four that were agreed by the NFC itself – all four during the tenure of civilian governments - in 1974 (Z A Bhutto), 1990 (Nawaz Sharif), 1996 (caretaker government led by Meraj Khalid) and 2009 (Zardari-led government).

The 1979 and 1985 awards were announced during the presidency of Ziaul Haq who did constitute the NFC with a civilian, Ghulam Ishaq Khan, as chair but a consensus was never reached. The change in the 1985 award as noted in the Table was due to the adjustment made subsequent to the 1981 census.

The 2000 and 2006 awards were announced during Musharraf’s tenure and met the same fate as........

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