KARACHI, Nov 16: Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani has said the financial arrangement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) would help promote good governance and improve economic planning.
“This is not for the first time that Pakistan has engaged with the IMF. During a couple of past governments, the IMF was very much there,” he said at the launching ceremony of a collection of newspaper columns of federal Adviser on Textile Industry Dr Mirza Ikhtiar Baig at the Chief Minister’s House.
Sindh Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah, Acting Governor Shehla Raza, Prime Minister of Azad Kashmir Sardar Attique Ahmed Khan, Sindh Senior Minister Pir Mazharul Haq, Minister for Agriculture Syed Ali Nawaz Shah, president of the Saarc Chamber of Commerce and Industry Tariq Sayeed, federal and provincial ministers, MNAs and MPAs and business leaders.
The prime minister also said that the entire world, including the developed countries, had been hit hard by the global economic recession, adding: “Nothing is wrong with our policies. The economic crisis is an international phenomenon.”
He said that the government would provide maximum relief to the masses and the industry and trade with the decline in international oil prices.
“This process has just started,” Mr Gilani said.
The government, he said, was focussing on building up the economy supplemented by good governance and cooperation.
He said that the business community should not feel discouraged, adding that the government would fully supported them because it considered them to be one of the pillars of national economy.
Mr Gilani said Pakistan was not an oil-producing country; its economy was based on agriculture and the government was taking effective measures to diversify its economic base.
He said: “It is imperative to improve law and order situation to boost trade and commerce and the government is taking all possible measures in this regard.”
He said religious leaders and the media could do a lot to promote peace and prosperity.
The prime minister said the government believed in dialogue and could hold talks with militants in tribal areas if they handed over their weapons to political agents.
He said unlike in the past, people in tribal areas were fighting the militants.
He stressed on the need for strengthening law-enforcement agencies and said that Pakistan’s army was the best in the
world.—APP