KARACHI, Jan 6: The second pre-bid meeting of the Pakistan State Oil (PSO) will be held in the last week of this month to discuss the bidding process and finalise the date of bidding.
This was stated by Adviser to the Prime Minister for Privatization and Investment, Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh in a meeting with members of the Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) on Monday.
“I will talk to the potential bidders for the convenient date and hopefully the pre-bid meeting will be held on January 30,” he said adding that the oil giant company will be privatized in the first quarter of this year.
The last pre-bid meeting of PSO was held in November where potential bidders like Kuwait Petroleum Company (KPC), MIDROC and Fauji Foundation discussed assorted matters pertaining to the privatization of the public sector giant. Broad-based matters raised by the bidders relating to the completion of the due diligence exercise with a view to providing clarity and ensuring that the transaction would be smoothly brought to an early completion. Most of these issues were resolved in the November meeting.
However, the bidders had raised the issue of outstanding amount worth billions of rupees which the two state utility giants Wapda and KESC have to pay to the PSO.
The government had invited expressions of interest in March and April 2002. Six parties had submitted their statement of qualification and subsequently five parties were pre-qualified to participate in the privatization process of the PSO.
Later another Kuwaiti party backed off, reducing total number of prospective bidders to four. However, in the first meeting in Karachi, ChevronTexaco, a bidder, was also absent. The government plans to privatize PSO as an integrated company by selling 51 per cent stake in the company to a qualified strategic buyer.
On privatization of KESC, Dr Hafeez Shaikh said the future course of strategy will be discussed in the next one week or 10 days. Similarly, he said in the next few days, he would review the privatisation process of Pakistan International Airline (PIA).
“Privatisation of all the big corporations, which are in advanced stage and in the pipeline, will remain intact and must be completed,” the adviser said adding that by after their privatization, the government would open new doors to other transactions.
“Our basic philosophy of the privatization policy will remain same,” he said referring to the philosophy based on three aspects — right process, right buyer and right price. The government is committed to privatizing big corporations in a transparent manner and through open bidding.
To a query over dilly-dallying in privatisation process over the last two decades, he said, “there have been many hidden opponents in this process like heads of companies, ministers and company intelligence who create bottlenecks and are against privatization.” He added that now the government is in the process of preparing a strategy to handle and watch carefully these hidden opponents.
He defended the privatization process, saying that it is in the interest of the people of Pakistan. He assured that the government will take special care of common man in the privatization of KESC and ordinary men will definitely see a difference.
Dr. Hafeez said that Pakistan has not seen the privatization of any significant projects in the last 25 years except for United Bank Limited (UBL). Same mediocre status also persists as far as arrival of investment is concerned. In the last one year, the country has seen an investment of only one billion dollars as compared to other developing countries.
“Why Pakistan is a difficult place to invest. We will have to find it out. It is still a big question,” he said.