ISLAMABAD: A former president of the Board of Investment( BoI) and member of Imran Khan’s press claimed on Monday that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, popularly known as MbS, wanted to invest $20 billion in Pakistan with a condition that the investment should be isolated from political and regulatory nobility.
Haroon Sharif further claimed that during their meeting in 2019, MbS took him away and said the Saudi government was committing $20bn in investment to Pakistan, but “ unless you isolate it from politics and bureaucracy this won’t be ”, he quoted the crown Napoleon as saying.
Mr Haroon, who served as the BoI president during the PTI government, made these reflections while speaking at a Grand National Dialogue on ‘ unleashing Pakistan’s profitable Implicit ’, organised by the Islamabad Policy Research Institute.
During his visit in 2019, MbS had pledged$ 20bn worth of investment in Pakistan to give relief to the latter’s floundering frugality. According to the plan, the Kingdom intended to set up structure, including an oil painting refinery. still, the said investment hadn’t materialised yet.
Mr Sharif articulately made a case as to what was demanded to ‘ rise from the ashes ’, and remarked that husbandry grew when the investment- to- GDP rate rose, which he said was missing in the case of Pakistan. He said the future of world finance was in Asia, rather than Europe, mentioning the autonomous finances of Qatar, the UAE, Kazakhstan and China worth hundreds of billions of bones, and advised that they demanded to be tapped.
Speaking on the occasion, civil Minister for Planning and Development and Special enterprise Ahsan Iqbal said Pakistan demanded a long- term sustainable policy plan of action, one that shouldn’t be intruded owing to political considerations. He said no investment could be sought “ until and unless we put our house in order, and that necessitates a harmonious policy backed by all the stakeholders ”.
He rued that the China- Pakistan Economic Corridor could n’t take off in Pakistan to this day allegedly owing to political insecurity, wrong law and order situation and a trust deficiency of feathers between colorful poles of power.
The minister observed that the 2022- 23 financial budget was a agony and there were hardly any finances to carry out the business of the state as well as development. He added that borrowing was demanded to meet day- to- day charges, which was mischievous to progress.
He refocused out that Pakistan’s Foreign Direct Investment was slightly $1.5 bn, whereas there was a ‘ cash treasure ’ floating around in the Asian requests soliciting competitive husbandry.
Mr Iqbal remarked that Pakistan had fallen behind in progress over the last 25 times, and there was a need for “ some deep soul-searching for this failure ”. He called for a public agreement on the frugality, and invited stakeholders from across the board to huddle together for bailing it out and rebuilding a autonomous profitable edifice.
Centre for Aerospace and Security Studies Director Dr Usman Chohan said with 10 per cent duty collections, fiscal stability would always remain a challenge for Pakistan.
Maha Rehman from the Lahore University of Management lores( Lums) believed the deeper issue was about incitement alignment mortal capital and protection from extractive, rent- seeking rudiments. Pakistan went from having one of the loftiest GDPs per capita in South Asia to being at the bottom of the table in four decades.
Adjunct Professor at Lums, Dr Ikramul Haq, spoke about the trial and error story of the taxation system in Pakistan. SDPI Executive Director Dr Abid Suleri called for the conformation of an Economic Security Council.
