STRONG INSTITUTIONS MUST FOR LONG TERM ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT – ICCI PRESIDENT

Now that the democracy has been fully restored, it is time to make a new beginning by establishing strong institutions in the country where institutions should have more worth and importance instead of personalities and all decisions should be made in the supreme national interest rising beyond party interests while all institutions should work for the development of the country remaining within their authorized domain, stated Muhammad Ijaz Abbasi, President, Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry while commenting on current ambivalent political and economic situation in the country. He said Pakistan is once again standing at the crossroads and the country needs a clear direction & sound economic policies to put it on the trajectory of long term economic development. He said in post-Musharraf era while the main hurdle has removed itself; the field is now open for the politicians to address the most pressing problems facing the nation.

Muhammad Ijaz Abbasi said though democracy has been fully restored, but clouds of uncertainty and ambiguity are still hovering over the country due to the indecisiveness of coalition partners on important issues like selection of a consensus candidate for Presidency and restoration of non-functional judges etc. He said immediately after the resignation of Pervez Musharraf, stocks shined for two days on hopes for political and economic stability, however, due to indecisiveness on important issues, bullish trend in the capital market could not survive and it tumbled by 393 point down to 10525 points and rupee shed by 40 percent against dollar exposing the country again to the political instability and this situation calls for settlement of all burning issues on urgent basis to turn depressing signs in the economy into positive ones.

ICCI President said Pakistan’s economy is in hot waters these days as all economic indicators are on downward trend. He said our current account deficit jumped up by 24 percent to 1.01 billion dollars during the first month of current fiscal year against 816 million dollars during the same period of last fiscal year, depicting an increased of 194 million dollars which was mainly due to rising trade and income deficits, besides huge foreign payment and slow foreign inflows. Pakistan’s textile and clothing exports also declined by 2.62 percent in July 2008-09 over the same month last year which was witnessed in almost all categories of textile and clothing, both in terms of value and volume as textile exports came to $905.912 million in the period under review compared to $930.328 million in the corresponding period of previous year. He said these are not healthy signs to boost the confidence of investors in Pakistan’s economy and government should take urgent remedial measures to make a turnaround.

In the end, Muhammad Ijaz Abbasi said now is the time that coalition partners should put their heads together to formulate a strategy to steer the country out of political and economic crisis. He warned that if the coalition government remains unable to govern effectively, then discordant policies and their weak implementation could cause a further a setback to the economy and to investor confidence. Therefore, he demanded that the coalition partners should to rise to the occasion by working towards the resolution of all thorny issues without any further loss of time to put the country on right track where business and industry could flourish and economic activities could thrive without any hassle.