Energy Minister Khurram Dastgir shared that Pakistan is on the way to an agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) as the two sides have reached consensus on almost all issues.
Pakistan – with a $350 billion economy – is seeking a critical $1.1 billion tranche from the IMF to avoid default. The fund has covered a huge gap of around Rs 900 billion, equivalent to 1% of gross domestic product (GDP) – a major obstacle to effecting a staff-level agreement.
Speaking to JEE News’ on Monday, the minister said that the IMF has not asked the government to reduce its defense budget.
“Instead, they [IMF] have asked the energy division to cut their losses,” the minister said. He added that the global lender has also demanded the government to reduce line losses in the northern, southern and western regions of the country.
He said that the fund has made it clear to Pakistan that the country has to put its house in order, adding that the country has to increase its tax revenue and reduce losses.
Dastgir said that after the withdrawal of America from Afghanistan, the world powers are not ready to show lenience in Pakistan.
Things to stick around for a while: Miftah
As the government continues to negotiate with the IMF, former finance minister Miftah Ismail has predicted that even if the government succeeds in securing the IMF’s bailout program, things on the economic front ” It will be tight.”
“Things will be tight for a while but we can get enough loans for now that we will have some space,” Miftah said during question-and-answer session with the former finance czar on popular microblogging. Answered the question asked during. site, Twitter, on Sunday.
Responding to a question regarding the economic loss due to the delay in restoring the bailout programme, Miftah, who was the PML-N’s finance minister before Ishaq Dar, said that Pakistan had failed in the eyes of international players. Lost credibility, which is “too expensive.”
The IMF team has been in Islamabad for the past few days to hold talks with the Pakistani authorities. After technical-level talks between Pakistan and the IMF’s negotiating team led by Nathan Porter, the two sides will start policy-level talks from today. The lender has imposed strict conditions on Pakistan in various sectors.
