Minister terms criticism on CPEC ‘unjust’

LAHORE: Planning and development minister Ahsan Iqbal on Tuesday rejected the criticism on Chinese investment in Pakistan, saying the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) would lead to economic benefits.   

Iqbal, speaking at a two-day Marcon 2017 conference, said the criticism is ‘unjust’. Chinese are relocating their industries to Vietnam, Cambodia and Bangladesh because of higher wages in China, he added.

“It is in Pakistan’s interest to lure the Chinese to relocate their industries along the CPEC route,” minister Iqbal said. “This would create jobs in Pakistan and increase our exports besides transferring technologies in our country.”  He defended the emphasis of the present government on infrastructure. He said road and rail infrastructure provides connectivity to remote areas. It is essential to build roads because only then the social sector activities, like education and health, could be carried out.

The federal minister urged Pakistanis to have faith in their capabilities. He said no country in the world has ever grown if its people have doubt over their capabilities. He said pessimism breeds depression and impacts nation’s growth.  He said CPEC was conceived in 2014 and by December 2016 the first large consignment of goods from China was shipped through Gwadar to Africa and Middle East. 

The project benefits both Pakistan and China. Of the four pillars of CPEC, the development of Gwadar is the first priority. In the next 20 years, Gwadar would be the most important and busiest deep sea port of the region.  Iqbal said the CPEC’s next priority is energy. Commercially-viable coal, alternate energy and hydropower projects worth $34 billion will increase energy security of the country at affordable price. 

He said infrastructure, including road, rail and communication, is another important CPEC’s aspect. These projects would pave the way for mass industrialisation. Special economic zones would also be established in all the four provinces, federally administered tribal areas, Gilgit Baltistan and Azad Kashmir under the CPEC.

The minister said network cable would be laid from Kashgar to Islamabad to provide Pakistan a dependable alternate source of internet connectivity.  Minister said Pakistan is an important strategic partner of China in CPEC as well as Chinese broader ‘One Belt, One Road’ scheme. 

“Pakistan is an important part of this expected growth if we play our cards right,” minister Iqbal said. “Pakistan, in fact, enjoys strategic location that through CPEC route connects the energy-rich regions of Iran and Middle East to the energy-starved region of China, Afghanistan and Russia.

Meanwhile, participants of Marcon 2017 were disappointed when the minister left the conference after his presentation on CPEC without addressing the apprehensions of many experts about the transparency in its projects.  According to the original schedule, the minister was required to go through the presentation from another angle by the JS Global CEO Kamran Nasir and then deliver his lecture and make the presentation.

Nasir in his presentation regretted that the minister referred to Price Water Cooper‘s positive remarks about Pakistan’s economy without going into the details of the report. He said the report did gave a positive view of the economy, but linked Pakistan’s progress in the next decade to number of conditions that mainly included substantial improvement in governance and transparency.

He said the report also stated the progress would mainly depend on the political will of the government to institute reforms. He conceded that Pakistan is currently going in the right direction. The returns on its stock market investment averaged 173 percent, against 20 percent in China and 30 percent in India.

Nasir said security issue has been largely addressed and governance has started improving, but there is a long way to go. Pakistan’s risk premium has gone down and its macroeconomic stability is commendable. However, he opined that Pakistan’s manufacturing sector has not been provided a level playing field in industrial zones. Most of the benefits of CPEC, he added, would go to China.