A spokesperson for Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) in a statement on Friday said that they want Finance Minister Ishaq Dar to resign and apologise to citizens for taking the country to the brink of default and unleashing 38 percent inflation.

The PTI spokesperson further said that the Economic Survey FY2023 “paints a truly dismal picture of the economy”.

“The epic failure of the PDM government has led to a ‘never-seen-before’ crisis with eight million workers becoming unemployed in FY2023, the unemployment rate rising to 10%, and causing nearly 18 million households to fall below the poverty line.”

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“The epic failure of his ‘Dar peg’ policy has showcased again why we believe he is unfit for this job, with a complete lack of basic understanding of markets and economic policy. This policy has brought the economy to the brink of a default, with SBP reserves now standing at only $3.9bn, not even enough to finance one month of imports. They were $10.5 billion at the time of the VONC,” the statement added.

Amidst the economic crisis, the coalition government presented an expansionary budget for fiscal year 2023-24 on Friday.