Pakistan fell prey to IMF due to poor policies of the past : PM

ISLAMABAD: Highlighting that the depreciation of rupee added to Pakistan’s indebtedness, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif Wednesday said that country fell prey to International Monetary Fund (IMF) only due to wrong decisions taken by the past regimes.

“The poor economic policies practiced by the previous governments forced us to borrow from the lender of the last resort. I wish we get out its jaws as soon as possible”, said Nawaz while addressing a special meeting of the federal cabinet here.

He mentioned that India had came out of the IMF programme and hoped that Pakistan’s economic situation would also improve.

Prime Minister said the government was also striving to overcome energy crisis and had devised a comprehensive long and short-term policy in this regard. He said projects were being launched to generate cheap electricity through coal, wind, hydel and solar resources.

He said the nation was facing grave energy crisis again due to wrong policies of the previous governments. Sharif added that the government was also taking measures to cut down line losses and improve power distribution system, which could help reduce load shedding.

He said Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) had committed to fund Karachi Circular Railway project.

He said JICA would provide up to $2 billion for the project and Pakistan-Japan talks for this project would be initiated shortly.

Finance Minister, Ishaq Dar, while briefing the federal cabinet said due to the government’s economic measures in six months, the budget deficit had been reduced from 8.8 to 8.2 percent.

He said 30 percent cut in the budgets of all ministries and affiliated departments and 40 percent in the finance ministry had been made on the directives of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

He said the discretionary funds of the Prime Minister and all ministers had also been abolished, which will save Rs40 billion annually.

Dar said an additional amount of Rs2 billion would be saved, as there will be a bar on secretaries not to become part of any board.

The finance minister said the government had banned the import of duty free vehicles to improve national economy.

He said the government cleared the circular debt of 480 billion rupees within 45 days after coming into power.

He said 1700 MW electricity had been added to system after payment of the circular debt. The finance minister dispelled the impression that banknotes were printed to pay circular debt.

Going forward, Dar vowed to increase country’s foreign reserves up to 16 billion dollars in 12 months after tackling current account deficit.

He said the government was vigorously pursuing with non-conventional sources including launch of Euro bonds and remittances-based bonds.

The finance minister said through GSP Plus status, exports of the country were expected to increase by 1.5 to 2 billion dollars.

He said outstanding $800 million would soon be recovered from Etisalat.