PPP senators allege govt selling PIA, PSM at throwaway prices

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) on Wednesday in the Senate doubted the government’s intention on hasty decision to privatise the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) and Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM), citing Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbai’s association with aviation and ex-PM Nawaz Sharif’s with steel industry.

PPP senators alleged that the government wanted to sell at ‘OLX’ the key state entities at throwaway prices with general election a few months away. Chairman Senate Mian Raza Rabbani disallowed an adjournment motion moved by Senator Farhatullah Babar to discuss the dispatch of Pakistani troops to Saudi Arabia bypassing the unanimously adopted parliamentary resolution affirming neutrality in the ongoing military conflict in the region.

“The minister for defence has already made a policy statement in the Senate and a number of senators also spoken on the subject and further discussion therefore is disallowed,” Chairman Rabbani remarked.

Pressing his point, Senator Babar said the ISPR announced the decision last week after a meeting between army chief and Saudi ambassador in Islamabad, which was preceded by a three-day visit to Saudi Arabia during which the army chief also met Crown Prince Salman and military commanders.

He listed two questions which he said remained unanswered and necessitated further discussion through adjournment motion. One, whether during the recent meeting of the army chief with Saudi crown prince the Pakistani ambassador in Saudi Arabia was present and whether a representative of the FO was also present in the subsequent meeting between the Saudi ambassador and the army chief in the GHQ.

Two, even without disclosing the troops’ location, what is the guarantee that they will not be deployed along the Saudi-Yemen border in which case they can get sucked in the conflict in case hot pursuit became necessary, he asked.

He said that several other questions remain unanswered including the nuanced FO statements condemning the Houthi missile attacks as threat to the Kingdom and Holy Mosques. Such statement seemed to justify Pakistani troops actively engaging the Yemenis in the conflict on the side of the Saudis.

Speaking on a calling attention notice regarding the privatisation of PIA and PSM, PPP Senators including Farhatullah Babar and Sehar Kamran alleged the government for deliberately selling the entities at throwaway prices at a time when it has a few months to go in next general elections.

“The government is about to complete its tenure and the decision taken in haste is a deliberate and engineered to sell the PIA and PSM at throwaway prices when we know that the sitting Prime Minister is associated with aviation industry while the former with steel industry”, Babar said adding that it appears that there is a “person” sitting there as how to make these non-profit entities to pave the way for privatisation.

Similarly, he maintained that shutting the gas supply for PSM and not paying the salaries of its employees was also part of the plan while the actual focus is on the 19000 acre land of the PSM.

Senator Sehar Kamran, who also staged a token walkout from the House against the government decision, expressed the fear that both the entities would be handed over to the sitting Prime Minister and to his predecessor.

“This is a well thought-out conspiracy, they, while exiting from the power corridors, are bent upon selling everything on the ‘OLX’, she maintained. “This is even comprehensible from the fact that PIA flights to New York were suspended while the Air Blue started its operation”, she maintained, adding that the PIA routes are also being given to private airlines.

Responding to the concerns of the Senators, Minister for Privatisation Daniyal Aziz rejected any conspiracy behind the planned privatisation of the PIA and PSM. He said that privatisation of the PIA is being done in the light of the special committee of the Parliament representing all the political parties constituted by the Speaker National Assembly after a joint sitting of the parliament two years back.

Resultantly, the 1956 PIA Act was recommended by the financial advisers to be converted into a new one – the PIAC Conversion Act of 2016 aimed at providing legal basis for the privatisation of the PIA as it was not available in the old Act, he said. He said that it was part of the structural benchmark of the IMF programme of 2014.

He said the entire Parliament endorsed the new legislation and was passed unanimously. He said that there was no question of raising doubts when PPP was part of the whole exercise, adding that it was not a decision taken overnight and everything is being done according to the Act.

The minister said that the management of PIA will remain with the federal government, while 49 percent shares will be sold while 51 percent will be with the government. He said that the government intends to separate transport business from the airline’s assets and the entity would be owned by the federal government. In this transaction, he added, majority shares and management control will remain with the government.

Various assets and liabilities that are not part of air transport business will be shifted to a new company which is yet to be named, he said and added that by separating the transport business, the investment rate of PIA will be restored making the national flag carrier a positive equity company.

He rejected the impression that the entities would be sold at throwaway prices, saying that there would be an evaluation process to take place which would determine the highest price and it would be done by an internationally certified person.

On the PSM, he also put aside the reservations of the Senators saying that Nawaz Sharif had winded up his steel business 25 years back while the machinery installed has also been removed.

He said the sensitivity of Sindh government has taken into account while deciding the PSM privatisation especially with regard to the land, adding that the land would not be transferred with its privatisation. Only the 4500 acre land surrounding the plant and machinery of the mills will be leased for a period of 30 years and there is no transfer of the land on the ownership, he stated in a categorical terms.

He noted that employees of the PSM would not be removed and arrangements would be made if those want to be re-employed. He also urged the Sindh government and the PPP to assist the government in the smooth privatisation of these entities.

The House also adopted a report of the special committee on PIA to probe into the circumstances under which the alleged sale of PIA Air bus 310 to a German firm, who played what role and how the former CEO, a German national, was allowed to leave the country despite his name being on the ECL.

A sub-committee headed by Senator Farhatullah Babar and including Senator Nauman Wazir and Tahir Hussain Mashhadi had been formed to probe the matter.

The report stated that the sale of airbus was unauthorised, there were glaring flaws in the tendering process, the normal procedure was bypassed and it was sold at a very low price. The blame could not be laid on the shoulders of just two persons and the culpability was much wider, it said.

The report called for diligently pursuing enquiry by NAB to which it has already been referred and that the Senate Secretariat be kept informed regularly of the progress in it.

The report further said that the former CEO be brought back to Pakistan and in this connection the Foreign Office should take up the matter with the German Embassy in Islamabad on whose guarantee and commitment the permission was given.

PML-N Senator from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Nisar Mohammad announced his resignation as member of the Senate as well as from his party, saying that he was taking decision following PTI’s award of a ticket to his brother Haji Fida Mohammad.