KARACHI, Nov 14: The city government’s plan to set up an independent secretariat to attract foreign investors has been delayed for a few months, officials in the city government said.
The first attempt by the hierarchy of the city government to get services of some prolific individuals to place them on the top positions of its lately-conceived foreign investment secretariat could not materialize because the candidates responded to the city government advertisement was thought ineligible to fulfill the task.
Originally, the city government had decided to set up a foreign investment secretariat within a week in March. The city government had placed an advertisement a few months ago to get the services of a highly qualified individual to head the secretariat and a few others for assisting him.
“A number of professionals had turned up to the city government’s top hierarchy and were interviewed for the top posts but none of them was capable enough to be given the assignment to attract investors from across the world,” said a city government official.
City Nazim Mustafa Kamal confirmed the report saying that he failed to get the individuals who could lead the foreign investment secretariat.
He said: “But, we have not abandoned the idea. In fact, we believe that there are many professionals in our country who could fulfill our criteria and they might have not gone through our previous advertisement.” He said that the city government would again advertise for the post. “I believe, it will be enough for us to launch our campaign for full-scale foreign investments in Karachi, otherwise we can also go for international advertisement,” said Mr Kamal.
The nazim said Karachi had huge potential for foreign investment in various fields, which was evident from the response and offers he was receiving from across the world. He said he was pleased to note that dozens of the multinational firms were willing to invest in the city.
“A separate secretariat is extremely required to tackle the issues relating to investment coming from rest of the world and we are going to establish it,” he said.
The city government foreign investment secretariat would facilitate foreign investors through the country’s foreign embassies. The foreigners would be properly guided concerning their investments.
“It will be some sort of marketing department of the city government which would keep an eye on the investment opportunities for Karachi from across the world and would make efforts through the Pakistani embassies to materialize them,” he said.
