(January 27-2023)
Chairman of National Business Group Pakistan, President Pakistan Businessmen and Intellectuals Forum, and All Karachi Industrial Alliance, and former provincial minister Mian Zahid Hussain on Friday said over the last several decades there has hardly been a finance minister who after lashing out against the IMF hasn’t agreed to their conditions.
Statements against the IMF do not harm this institution, but we have to face the music therefore this practice should be stopped, he said.
Mian Zahid Hussain said that the cost of the delay in the implementation of the program is paid by the country and the people.
Talking to the business community, the veteran business leader said that all finance ministers always claim to run the country without the support of any lender which results in an economic collapse.
Borrowing from IMFs is delayed as a routine and once the loan is granted, the program is not implemented, which increases mistrust, he added.
He said that we should know the fact that the IMF does not ask any country for lending, rather it is the countries in trouble that beg for loans.
Mian Zahid Hussain said that Saudi Arabia has also done a favor to Pakistan by advising it to make reforms instead of getting more loans, which made the government realize the seriousness of the situation, and they restored contact with the IMF and assured to meet  all their conditions which have increased the value of the dollar in Pakistan by 30 rupees and a further increase is expected but it will increase the revenue, exports, remittances, and loans from IMF and friendly countries.
Barriers to acquisitions and rollover of loans will be removed, and general inflation, petroleum products, electricity, gas prices, markup, and debt burden will increase but all this is inevitable in the current situation.
Mian Zahid Hussain said that no one has been able to make reforms in Pakistan whether it is a political party or a dictatorship. No government ends the privileges given to the elite, nor does the subsidies are removed.
Electricity, gas, and energy policies, the price of energy, continued losses of failed institutions, and attempts to administratively devalue the dollar continue to burden the country’s economy, he said.
