ISLAMABAD, Aug 28: The government has decided to reassess the transaction structure of Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL) for sale in the light of telecom deregulation policy and reinvite bids for the sale of Karachi Electric Supply Corporation (KESC).

Minister for privatisation and investment Dr. Abdul Hafeez Sheikh told reporters on Thursday that it has been decided to reassess the PTCL sale transaction and to see whether the company should be restructured before privatization.

He did not agree with the suggestion that international telecom market was under recession but said the appetite of the sector was somehow subdued. He said the privatization of the PTCL was started in early 1990s and a number of attempts were made which remained unsuccessful.

In the light of past experience and deregulation package, the shape and nature of the company and its sale process was being looked into afresh so that a successful transaction is achieved, he said.

He said three companies had been prequalified in the past and some more players were coming forward. He said he was unable to give a final date or shape of the PTCL sale because the unit was too big and the government wanted to move very carefully.

Talking about the KESC, the minister said three/four new international companies have informally shown interest to take part in its bidding. The government has now decided to restart the process because no serious offer was available in the past and new expressions of interest (EOIs) would be invited in the next few days.

He said three bidders for the sale of Faisalabad Electric Supply Company (FESCO) have prequalified and a pre-bid conference would be held next month so that the transaction is closed by end of the year. He said Jamshoro Power Generation Company would also be privatized before end of the year.

Responding to a question on Habib Bank Limited (HBL), Dr. Sheikh said data room of the bank would be opened for the six prequalified bidders on September 3, 2003.

He said a pre-bid conference for the sale of HBL would also be convened within a month to finalise a date of bidding in consultation with the bidders. He was hopeful that the transaction would complete by December this year.

Talking about Pakistan State Oil (PSO), the minister said that there was no delay in the privatization but some time was provided on the request of Kuwait Petroleum Company (KPC), which wanted to have approval from their new parliamentary committee following fresh elections in Kuwait.

He said three serious companies were in the run for the PSO and all issues including those relating to liabilities have also been settled. He said the bidding date for the privatization of the oil giant would be finalized in October with the consent of the bidders.

The minister did not agree that privatization process was slow, and said that normally a transaction took around 12-15 months to complete provided there was no unexpected difficulty.

Nevertheless, he said the units like PSO, PTCL and HBL were profitable units and the government had nothing to lose even if privatization of these go beyond schedule by a couple of months.

He said that the present government had secured around Rs6 billion in privatization proceeds within a short period of eight months which no other government could do in the past. Of the Rs6 billion proceeds, Rs5 billion were earned through stock market and less than Rs1 billion from the sale of ICP Mutual Fund.