August 2, 2002	Friday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 22,1423

ISLAMABAD, Aug 1: The privatization of United Bank Limited (UBL) took new turn on Thursday as the second highest bidder—Abu Dhabi and Bestway Holdings Group—offered to raise its bid beyond its latest written offer of Rs12.3 billion.

Official sources said that the second highest bidder was desperately seeking to have 51 per cent shares of the UBL along with the transfer of management, although the first highest bidder—MCB Group—has substantially raised its bid from Rs8.5 billion to Rs12 billion against the reference price of Rs11.8 billion.

The Privatization Commission Board had recommended to the Cabinet Committee on Privatization (CCoP) to approve the increased bid of MCB group as it has followed the procedure. The group has also re-submitted its financing plan which was now being examined by the State Bank of Pakistan.

The sources said the CCoP, waiting for the clearance by the central bank, was to meet possibly next week for formally approving the deal. However, now a new situation has arisen as the representatives of Abu Dhabi and Bestway Holdings had met the Minister for Privatization Altaf M. Saleem on Tuesday last and given him the raised bid of Rs12.3 billion in writing but it was termed as “beyond the process”.

The representatives of the second highest group again contacted the PC officials on Thursday and said that they were even ready to raise their bid even beyond Rs12.3 billion.

“This is a new situationand we are examining it from all sides,” a senior official of the Privatization Commission said.

When contacted he assured that the UBL deal will be transparent and open and that the government would very much want the maximisation of the deal.

Responding to a question, he said that the government did not want to lose the public money by selling UBL on throwaway price. “We are very careful and we know that if the deal is not transparent it will notgo unnoticed specially by National Accountability Bureau (NAB).”

The sources said that Minister for Finance Shaukat Aziz has said that he believed in the transparent process of privatization. But he also said that if someone was offering more money, he should also be considered and that state sector entities should get maximum price.

The minister for privatization had said on Wednesday that the issue of UBL will be taken to the federal cabinet after the second highest bidder has offered to raise its bid from Rs4.8 billion to Rs12.3 billion.

Earlier, the State Bank had cleared all the three bidders to take part in the privatization of the UBL, which included MCB Group, Abu Dhabi & Bestway Holdings and Union Bank group.

Former Secretary Defence Production Division and now the representative of Abu Dhabi and Bestway Holdings Mazhar Rafi was on record having said that since MCB Group has raised its bid, it deserved to be offered UBL.