PPP Chairperson Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari said on Thursday that the federal government had promised that allocations for provinces under the 7th National Finance Commission (NFC) award would be “protected”, and that the Centre would not request any further “help or sacrifice” following the recent decision to freeze development allocations for the provinces. The government has decided to freeze development allocations for the provinces for three years to generate more than Rs900 billion in additional resources for the Centre’s strategic needs. Bilawal is currently addressing the National Assembly, which is debating the proposed federal budget for the next fiscal year (FY27).