Pakistan is witnessing the first major coalition experiment at the federal level and the government will remain stable as long as the experiment remains successful, according to a Pakistani federal minister.
“All the coalescing partners now have their proven vote banks and there is no need for them to compete with each other. They need to complement rather than compete,” Muhammad Farooq Sattar told Arab News in an interview on the sidelines of a community meeting hosted by ZULTEC Managing Director and CEO Zulqiurnain Ali Khan on Saturday.
“The time has come when we have to decide the course of our future,” he said. “The prescription for Pakistan’s future lies in its political, social and economic reforms,” he said, adding that there has to be a clear vision to reach the progress achieved by countries like China, India and even Vietnam.
“Politically we have to strengthen our democracy, and end feudalism, and embark on land reforms and other economic measures,” he said.
The current impact of the global recession is an opportunity for all overseas Pakistanis to invest and take part in the country’s economic progress. A host of projects including wholesale businesses, textiles and garments, godowns, jetties, IT parks, the automobile sector and cottage industries await them. “We need to establish manufacturing and assembly plants to provide employment,” he said. “We need to have a one window approach for business instead of dampening the enthusiasm of enterprisers by having so many windows.”
He added: “We always had the political will. Now, the government has a vision. All coalescing partners know what to do but they are still not clear how to go about things.”
He referred to the timely economic reforms undertaken by Malaysia, Singapore and India. Manmohan Singh’s economic reforms in the 1990s (when he was the finance minister) are reaping dividends now (when he is the prime minister). They all succeeded because they addressed basic problems.
“The political mindset should be changed. The political psyche has to be changed. Economic sovereignty can bring real ‘azadi’ (independence).
Independence without economic sovereignty will not take us anywhere,” he said and urged overseas Pakistanis to help the country with their expertise, knowledge and education, and rebuild the confidence of the nation. He blamed feudalism for all the ills of the country and said unless there were revolutionary reforms, the country would remain in perpetual debt to the IMF.
On its part, the ministry is aware of the problems of the community here, including housing and higher education. Housing and business plots for overseas Pakistanis can be worked out. “Some of our cities have been victims of land grabbing, drug dealing and other menaces.
However, Karachi and Hyderabad are way ahead in terms of progress. It is not for any reason that the World Economic Forum in Davos has ranked Karachi as the 12th fastest developing city in the world.”
Describing overseas Pakistanis as the backbone of the country, Sattar said: “We recognize the need for them to have a right to vote and seats in the National Assembly.” He added that his party, MQM, was preparing a bill to be presented in the National Assembly reserving four seats for the representatives of overseas Pakistanis, one each from the Middle East, Africa, Europe and America.
The Ministry of Overseas Pakistanis has made an allocation of five million Pakistani rupees for the Saudi expatriate community to start two new schools, one in Riyadh and one in Jeddah.
Officially there are 1.2 million Pakistani expatriates in the Kingdom. “They are our roving ambassadors. They have to be integrated with the diplomatic missions of Pakistan so that they are able to present a real soft image of Pakistan,” he said.
A system of quick and rapid transfer of overseas remittances is being worked out with the help of the State Bank of Pakistan and hopefully it will be streamlined from Aug. 21. An effort is also being made to enable such transfers to take place by using cell phones, he said.
Asked about bilateral issues with India, he said dialogue was the only process through which the two countries could resolve their bilateral issues and work toward restoring peace in South Asia jointly with their neighbors.
