Good Days Ahead As World Eyeing Pakistan For Investment: Prime Minister Imran Khan

Prime Minister Imran Khan Friday said the government was taking every measure to bring ease of doing business and discourage red-tapism for creating an investor-friendly atmosphere in the country as the world was eyeing Pakistan for investment.

PESHAWAR, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 14th Dec, 2018 ) :Prime Minister Imran Khan Friday said the government was taking every measure to bring ease of doing business and discourage red-tapism for creating an investor-friendly atmosphere in the country as the world was eyeing Pakistan for investment.

Addressing a ceremony highlighting 100-day performance of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) government, he directed the bureaucracy to facilitate and ease the investment process. Unfortunately, the country was still facing the mindset begot by the nationalization of industries which resisted the investment, he added.

The event was attended by KP Governor Shah Farman, Chief Minister Mahmood Khan, cabinet members and parliamentarians, besides a huge number of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) workers.

The prime minister spoke high of the recently constructed five shelters for down-and-out people in Peshawar what he said, truly represented the mindset behind the State of Madinah, which showed compassion towards the poor.

He strongly defended his decisions of appointing Usman Buzdar and Mahmood Khan as chief ministers of Punjab and KP respectively and reiterated his trust in their honesty and credibility.

He said coming from a backward region, Buzdar had gone tough on mafias in the province.

As the prime minister was addressing the first public gathering after assuming the office, he formally thanked the people of KP to give his party mandate to serve them twice which was unprecedented.

He lamented the extravaganza of former Punjab chief minister, who had spent around Rs 350 million each on entertainment and his travel through the prime minister's aircraft.

He said the previous government had also doled out billions of rupees shortly before the election in the name of development works just to influence the voters.

Mentioning the excessive rate of children with stunted growth in Pakistan, the prime minister vowed to reform the health and education sectors, which had unfortunately been neglecting the poor.

Resolving to introduce a uniform education curriculum in the country, he said in the presence of existing education system, it was almost impossible for a student with a very humble background to compete in civil service examinations.

He lamented that no previous government had taken any concrete step to make the country a welfare state, saying, "I have been hearing since my childhood that Pakistan is an Islamic welfare state. Unfortunately all the policies were made for the benefit of a small segment of the society." The prime minister strictly directed the provincial cabinet members to regularly attend their offices and focus their policies for the welfare of masses. Warning them for action over slacking performance, he said now the pressure of any forward bloc had also ebbed away.

He gave three months time to provincial ministers to better their service delivery with main focus on improving the socio-economic condition of the people.

He said it was unfortunate that despite being a 210 million nation, Pakistan's exports volume stood at $24 billion against $220 billion of Malaysia and $330 billion of Singapore.

Defending his government's steps of auctioning luxury cars as well as buffaloes kept at the PM House, he said the country was still being run on the pattern of British, who used to live like a monarch in the region on the taxes paid by the local people.

The prime minister said the idea behind demolishing the boundary wall of Governor House Lahore was to give the people access to the magnificent building and advised the KP governor to invite student delegations to the Governor House Peshawar.

Reiterating his resolve to fight corruption, he urged the people to keep an eye on spending of their money by the government, as it was public money which was embezzled.

He said the administration had recovered land worth Rs 350 billion from illegal occupation in Islamabad and even more in Punjab. He rubbished the propaganda against the anti-encroachment operation and said it was the public property that had been vacated.

The prime minister assured the gathering that the country would get rid of financial deficit once the government regained public trust by spending taxes on the public's welfare.

He said that the people's trust in the government was necessary to expand the tax net. Unfortunately, out of 210 million population, only 72,000 people had shown their monthly income of Rs 200,000.

He said recently ExxonMobil, a renowned international company, had returned to Pakistan after 27 years showing interest in offshore gas exploration and hopefully the nation would hear good news by April next. "If all goes well, the new exploration will meet the country's gas demand for next 50 years," he added.

He said the US administration that had been harping on about 'Do More' for Pakistan' was now seeking the country's support to facilitate peace talks with the Taliban. He also criticized those, who had lebelled him as Taliban Khan after he had called for peace talks with the Taliban for a durable peace.

He said once peace was restored in Afghanistan, Peshawar would become a hub of trade and tourism. The government would convert Bala Hisar Fort into a tourism center after relocating Frontier Constabulary to an alternate place, he added.

The prime minister, about the erstwhile Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), said the KP governor and chief minister along with tribal members of the National Assembly would jointly set a roadmap for development projects of the area.

He said detailed deliberations were also held about the FATA interim law regulations, which had been suspended by the Peshawar High Court.

The prime minister said the local government system for tribal areas was very important as it would start resolving problems of the people at the grassroots level.

He directed the KP health minister to take action against all those officers, who were creating hurdles in the health reforms agenda of the PTI government.

He mentioned the removal of two health secretaries in the past over their alleged involvement in working against the government health reform agenda on the behest of mafia in the health sector.

The prime minister vowed to improve service delivery in all the government hospitals while introducing the carrot and stick policy as being practiced in private institutions.

About the rule of law, the prime minister directed the provincial government to immediately implement the Civil Procedure Code as the KP Cabinet had already passed the law for disposing of civil cases within an year.

Appreciating the landmark performance of previous KP government in the education field, he called for further improvement into it with special focus on higher education.

The prime minister termed planting of one billion trees by the KP government a historic achievement and congratulated them on the milestone. The Federal and Punjab governments would also replicate the KP model in their 10 billion tree plantation drive.

He directed the KP chief minister to convert the unutilized government land in cities into public parks and sports grounds, which would not require a big amount.

The prime minister said the federal government was constructing Momand Dam, which would not only produce electricity but also resolve the issue of drinking water in Peshawar forever.

Drinking water was an issue in all the major cities and the government had made a comprehensive programme to resolve the matter in next five years, he added.