February 22, 2002	Friday	Zilhaj 9, 1422

ISLAMABAD, Feb 21: The Cabinet Committee on Privatization (CCoP) is meeting here on February 26 to approve the disinvestment of 5 to 25 per cent shares of the Habib Bank Limited (HBL) by March next.

Informed sources said here on Thursday that the CCoP to be presided over by Minister for Finance Shaukat Aziz, will also approve the disinvestment of remaining 9 per cent government’s share in the Muslim Commercial Bank (MCB).

Further approval will be accorded by the CCoP to the privatization of Karachi Shipyard and Engineering Works.

The Privatization Commission Board had recommended to the CCoP to accord approval for the disinvestment of shares of HBL, MCB as well as the Karachi Shipyard.

According to Minister for Privatization Altaf Saleem, the government could earn roughly Rs1.6 billion if it decided to sell 10 per cent shares of the HBL. The government, he said, could disinvest up to 20 per cent shares of the HBL to earn about Rs 3.2 billion. “But we initially plan to concentrate on offering 10 per cent shares of the HBL.”

Earlier, the response of disinvesting 10 per cent shares of the National Bank had been very good that encouraged the government to off-load shares of other nationalised commercial banks.

The disinvestment of National Bank’s shares through stock markets had been widely appreciated both by the business community and the public at large.

The National Bank issue was 5.5 times oversubscribed against an issue of size of 5 per cent for Rs 186.5 million. There were 27,546 applications which were received for 103 million shares amounting to Rs1.04 billion.