THE seventh Joint Cooperation Committee meeting ended on Tuesday leaving more questions than answers in its wake.

This was supposed to be the meeting to finalise the so-called Long Term Plan for CPEC, which details all that will be done in the country under the umbrella of the corridor till the year 2030.

Yet, at the end it is not clear whether we have a final LTP or if some more work remains to be done.

The details shared with the public after the meetings ended are far too scattered to build a picture of what all has been agreed upon.

To this day, the public does not know what exactly their government is committing their country to.

All we know is that the plan is so massive in its scope as to be a ‘game changer’ for the country, and a few details about some projects that are being implemented within its framework.

If this is true then it is all the more important to have wider public buy-in so we have a clearer idea of how exactly the game will be changing.

But what we do know is that in reality the game is far bigger than what the government is projecting, and it is only just beginning.

Going forward, it is crucial that the government live up to its pledge to bring greater transparency to its dealings with the Chinese.

The pledge has been repeatedly given by the minister leading the negotiations, Ahsan Iqbal, in multiple forums including on television, and he must adhere to it.

The full, detailed LTP document must be made public, not any shortened or summarised version of it.

Of late, we have begun to hear language coming out of the Planning Commission that seeks to retreat from this pledge.

In one place, for example, the commission has said that the plan “will be shared with all stakeholders”, without elaborating who they consider to be a stakeholder.

The minister, when asked about his intentions to make the detailed plan public, simply said “it would be a good idea” without giving any indication as to when the step will be taken.

In all his earlier pronouncements, he was clear that the LTP document can only be made public after it had been finalised.

Now that we have crossed that threshold, it is time for the minister to deliver on his word.

Published in Dawn, November 23rd, 2017