ISLAMABAD, Feb 7: A meeting presided over by Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz on Tuesday apparently failed to resolve the prevailing sugar crisis despite concern voiced by President Pervez Musharraf over sky-rocketing prices of sugar and pulses.
Sources told Dawn that ministers and advisors traded allegations in the presence of the president and the prime minister in two meetings.
The only fresh step that emerged from day-long consultations was to engage the National Logistic Cell (NLC) to provide sugar in far-flung areas at a controlled rate of Rs27.5 per kilogramme from the Utility Stores Corporation’s monthly quota of 22,000 tons.
The president, during a review of the country’s economic situation in the morning, expressed concern over the rising prices of sugar and pulses and called for a government strategy to control them.
A participant of the meeting quoted Commerce Minister Humayun Akhtar as telling the president that policies of the finance ministry had failed because of its unilateral decisions. Had the relevant ministries been consulted, sugar import must have started six months back, Mr Akhtar reportedly said.
The president stressed the need for team work to minimize difficulties of the common man, sources said.
Later, a delegation of the Pakistan Sugar Mills Association (PSMA) asked a meeting presided over by Advisor to the PM on Finance Dr Salman Shah to provide subsidy for sugar import, remove sales tax, ban production of gur and remove the role of middlemen.
The PSMA team informed Mr Shah that middleman and unscrupulous hoarders were benefiting from the crisis but the government was indirectly pressuring the sugar mills.
In a subsequent meeting presided over by the prime minister, the ministers for commerce and industries reportedly accused the finance ministry advisors of allegedly running a campaign against them over the crisis. They protested over being bypassed in major decisions on sugar in the past and decisions through outside agenda item discussions.
They said that had they been involved in the consultations, they would have advised the government to import sugar six months ago, when international prices were very low. They said that it was for the first time that they had been consulted over the issue.
A participant said the commerce minister threatened to hold a press conference to expose those responsible for the crisis.
The sources said the prime minister agreed to investigate into the complaints.
Economic Advisor Dr Ashfaq Hassan, when contacted, denied that participants of the meting had exchanged hot words.
The meeting presided over by the prime minister did not agree to provide any subsidy on sugar import on the ground that it could only be provided at both the local market and import stages, which was not feasible.
The meeting upheld decisions taken on Jan 30 for importing 50,000 tons from India through land, air and sea routes without any customs duty and withholding tax to build strategic reserves and double supplies to the USC to 22,000 tons per month for the next 10 months as the Trading Corporation had over 223,000 tons of stocks.
The meeting was informed that landing cost of sugar from India in Lahore and Karachi would remain in the range of Rs38-40 per kilogramme as the prices had increased by Rs1-2 per kg over the past couple of days.
Dr Ashfaq Hassan said the government decided to encourage the private sector for augmenting sugar supplies side by side with the public sector and relevant procedures would be finalized after the Ashura holidays.
Commerce Secretary Asif Shah said there were 88,000 tons of imported and about 128,000 tons of domestic sugar stocks with the TCP.