KABUL - The Wolesi Jirga (WJ) on Sunday voted out two more ministers for their poor performance in terms of development budget spending, but Finance Minister Eklil Ahmad Hakimi survived the no-confidence vote.
On November 9, the house decided to summon 17 ministers who spent less than 70 percent of their development budgets during the current solar year.
On Saturday, lawmakers sacked Foreign Minister Salahuddin Rabbani, Labour and Social Affairs Minister Nasrin Oryakhel and Public Works Minister Mahmood Baligh.
Today, the lower house of parliament summoned Finance Minister Hakimi, Education Minister Hanif Balkhi and Transport and Civil Aviation Minister Mohammadullah Batash but they did not turn up.
Earlier in the day, a letter from Presidential Palace asked MPs to put on hold the no-trust vote against minister and sent hard copies of finance, education and transport ministers’ development budget spending. The ministers were not expected to appear before the lawmakers.
Inamullah Erfanyar, the Wolesi Jirga secretary, read out the letter from President Ashraf Ghani’s office in today’s session. The letter asked MPs to further evaluate the performance of sacked ministers in line with Article 92 of the Constitution.
In the absence of the ministers, 131 of the 203 legislators present voted against the education minister and 142 against the transport minister. As many as 112 MPs voted against and 85 for Hakimi. A minister could be unseated by 118-pluse votes. (Pajhwok)