ISLAMABAD, Oct 23: President Asif Ali Zardari criticised on Thursday economic policies of the previous government and said that foreign remittances worth billions of rupees had been misused over the past several years.

“Their proper utilisation could have saved the country from the prevailing economic crisis,” the president said while talking to a delegation of businessmen which called on him at the President House.

He said: “We could have averted the present difficult economic situation if tens of billions of dollars received in the form of assistance and foreign remittances after 9/11 had been wisely spent on infrastructure development, instead of importing consumer goods.”

President Zardari urged businessmen to step forward and play their role in overcoming economic and financial difficulties.

Stressing the need for innovative and bold approaches, he cited an example of Dubai which, despite its tiny size and small population, had attracted hundreds of billions of dollars in foreign investment. He said that Dubai even attracted a large number of tourists by developing a tourism industry.

Mr Zardari said he would hold similar consultative meetings with representatives of industry and commerce in future. “Meetings of relevant ministries with representatives of different sectors of business and industry should be held on a regular basis to find out solutions to the problems.”

The president asked Adviser to the Prime Minster on Finance Minister Shaukat Tareen to meet business representatives regularly and seek their suggestions to cope with the prevailing economic crunch.

Members of the delegation assured the president of their support and lauded business-friendly policies of the present government to attract more investment in different sectors of industry and commerce.

The meeting was attended by Board of Investment Chairman Saleem U. Mandviwala, Secretary Commerce Syed Asif Shah, Revenue Division Chairman Shahab Khawaja, Additional Finance Secretary Mohammad Ayub Tareen, S.M. Munir, Haji Masood, Khalid Tawab, Zahid Hussain, A. Haseeb Khan, Masood Naqi, Yahyha Polaki, Majid Aziz, Arshad Farooque, Fazal Jalil, Capt (retd) Moiz and Parwaiz Sohail.