ISLAMABAD:Coordinator Meher Kashif Younis urged the government to privatize state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in a foolproof and transparent manner incurring heavy losses of Rs 500 billion annually for decades, impacting the national kitty.
Talking to a delegation of women entrepreneurs led by Ms. Maheen, he said that the manifestos of almost all the mainstream political parties throughout the country always advocated divestment of government stakes in SOEs to curtail losses and reduce government footprint in business but actual implementation has been delayed for over half a century, said a news release here.
He said fresh official facts and figures revealed that due to mismanagement, the deficient SOEs inflicted overall huge losses of around Rs500 billion to the national exchequer during last year (2022).
He said however privatization of the banking industry was one of the biggest success stories in Pakistan which transformed from loss-making to profitable entity.
The overall performance of SOEs was not very healthy what is called “contrary to the expectations” adding that some of these were marred by gross bad governance.
He said other targeted companies in the pipeline for sale in the next phase between 2023-24 must also be placed on top priority for transparent privatization.
He said it’s an established fact worldwide that business activities are always carried out by the private sector not the public sector as the private sector employ the best possible ways to run in profit earning entities through good governance and timely decision on the spot also matter rather than lackluster attitudes in the public sector.
He emphasized the need to offer packages of incentives to buyers of loss-causing SOEs to run.