Minister for planning says issue will be taken up with China
ISLAMABAD: Sindh Finance Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah on Friday demanded that Keti Bandar be made a part of the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).
Shah took up the matter during a meeting of the Parliamentary Committee on CPEC, which met here in the morning with Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed in the chair.Shah presented the case of the Sindh government for establishing a port at Keti Bandar as a special terminal for export of coal, which would be mined at Thar, as well as a rail link and a special economic zone to support the proposed port.
The minister urged the federal government to convene a meeting of the CCI so that outstanding issues and concerns of Sindh and other provinces on the CPEC could be discussed and decided at the apex forum of the Parliamentary Committee on CPEC.
Shah presented the perspective of his province on the CPEC issue before the committee on the invitation of Senator Mushahid Hussain when he had met the Sindh chief minister in Karachi on January 28.
Minister for Planning, Development and Reforms Ahsan Iqbal assured the meeting that the Keti Bandar issue would be taken up with the Chinese government.Senator Mushahid Hussain directed the Ministry of Ports and Shipping to consult the experts of Sindh government to examine the feasibility of the project so that Thar could become the future energy power house of Pakistan. The committee also discussed the perspective of Sindh regarding the issues of Port Qasim.
There are issues of registration of land which is claimed by the Sindh government and is being utilised for the Port Qasim coal project.
After hearing both the sides, Mushahid directed the Ministry of Water and Power, Ministry of Ports & Shipping and Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Resources to have substantive and speedy discussions with the government of Sindh to resolve this issue, first at the working level and then the recommendations of the working level meetings would be taken up at a higher level under the auspices of parliamentary committee. These meetings will be concluded by the month of March.
On the issue of Sukhi Kenari hydel power project in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the committee chairman constituted a two-member sub-committee comprising Senator Salahuddin Tirmizi and Senator Shibli Faraz to coordinate both with the provincial and federal government to resolve the issue at the earliest, with meetings scheduled for early March.
Syed Murad Shah urged the government to convene a meeting of the CCI so that outstanding issues and concerns of Sindh and other provinces could be discussed and decided at the apex forum.
The Sindh government representatives thanked the committee for inviting them to the meeting.The meeting decided that the representatives of the Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa would be invited in March to present their perspective on the CPEC issues.
The meeting was attended by Minister for Planning, Development and Reforms Ahsan Iqbal, Minister for Port & Shipping Kamran Michael, Minister for States and Frontier Regions Lt. Gen. (retd) Abdul Qadir Baloch among others.