Govt to tighten purse strings, break begging bowl: Shehbaz

DI KHAN/ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif Tuesday pledged to break the begging bowl by curtailing the government expenses.

He said this while speaking as the chief guest at the inaugural and ground-breaking ceremony of eight communication and energy sector development projects. Shehbaz said ignoring power generation through hydel resources was a huge mistake that led to power shortages countrywide affecting households and the industry.

The prime minister said despite history’s most difficult period, the coalition government steered the country out of economic crisis. He said during the last 16 months, the government faced the most difficult challenges like the devastating floods that hit the country soon after it took charge. “We faced the devastating flood on one side, and inflation, IMF pressure and political crisis on the other. Such challenging problems have never been faced by me in my whole life,” he said.

Against this backdrop, he said all the coalition government parties had unanimously decided to ensure economic stability at all costs. “Such a resolve on their part helped the government bring the country out of crisis. There was record wheat production in a decade, which saved billions of dollars. However, Imran Niazi exploited his own created situation for political gains at the country’s cost,” he added.

The prime minister said their political opponents wished for the country’s default which, by the blessings of Almighty Allah, was averted. “Had the former regimes fully utilised the country’s rich resources such as hydropower, the country might have affordable and clean energy today,” he said and emphasised the need for overhauling the faulty power transmission system causing over Rs400 billion annual losses to the national exchequer.

A comprehensive plan of the Pakistan Green Initiative has been undertaken to take the country to new heights of development and prosperity, he said.

PDM chief Fazlur Rehman thanked the prime minister for his personal interest in ensuring the development of the area. He said former prime minister Nawaz Sharif had laid the foundation of many mega projects, which the PTI government seized, hampering economic development. Fazl said industrial estates being established in Bannu and Dera Ismail Khan would change the fate of the people of the area.

Minister for Energy Khurram Dastgir said the development projects, which remained suspended from 2018 to 2022, were being completed on priority. He said due to the PM’s personal intervention, 5,000 MW of electricity was added to the national grid in just 16 months. The transmission line in Thar was completed in a few months, while work on three new grid stations of Rs2 billion in Dera Ismail Khan was initiated by the current government, he added.

Meanwhile, addressing the third meeting of the International Partners Support Group (IPSG), Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said the government had established a robust mechanism in the form of Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC) to attract investments with a view to doing away with the “addiction” of borrowings and putting the country on the course to self-sustainability.

He said the government had chalked out an economic revival plan and its implementation would require foreign investment and technical support from friendly countries to enhance per acre yield of wheat, sugarcane and other commodities and focus on other areas of action.

He thanked the member countries and organisations for supporting Pakistan during the unprecedented floods and told them that the people still awaited return to their homes as they lacked funding to rebuild their destroyed houses. “This shows the severity of the challenge which requires untiring efforts by the government, friendly countries and international partners to help Pakistan build a climate-resilient infrastructure,” he added.

The prime minister thanked and appreciated the federal ministers for planning, climate change, finance, economic affairs and foreign affairs and their teams for reaching out to the international community and organising the Geneva Conference where international commitments were made. He told the participants that the country had been facing economic challenges like international inflation in terms of crude oil and commodities prices. He said as the government had reached an agreement with the IMF, it would strictly abide by it without any deviation.

Shehbaz said his government’s term was about to end by the next month, and the upcoming interim government would also surely be adhering to the IMF deal as the first tranche had already been received. He thanked the friendly countries and IMF managing director for helping Pakistan reach the $3 billion agreement for a nine-month period.

He assured the meeting that every penny coming from the donors for the rehabilitation of the flood victims would be spent transparently. He directed the relevant authorities that transparency should be given key importance in the rehabilitation and reconstruction projects of flood-affected areas. Third-party validation should be ensured in every project.

In the meeting, progress on flood recovery in Pakistan was reviewed. The prime minister appreciated the important role of IPSG in increasing cooperation as well as in climate resilience projects. The meeting was told that $657.5 million were estimated to be received by June 30, 2023, under the pledges made for various projects during the Climate Resilient Pakistan Conference, while $715 million have been received from donors and friendly countries for these projects.

During the current year 2023-24, around $913.5 million will be spent on construction and rehabilitation projects in flood-affected areas under the donors support. The meeting was further informed that 19 projects had been designed for flood prevention and rehabilitation of victims, including eight for Sindh, seven for Balochistan, three for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and one for the whole of Pakistan. The meeting was told that 64 percent of the money received for relief work was being spent in Sindh. It was told that $16.2 billion was estimated for reconstruction under the 4-RF, of which $8.15 billion are being funded by the federal and provincial governments through PSDP and ADP, while the matching amount will be provided by friendly countries and international organisations.