Bilateral ties: Economic corridor will bring prosperity, says Shahbaz Sharif

GCU organises conference on China-Pakistan Economic Corridor

LAHORE:

The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) will bring prosperity to Pakistan, said Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif on Wednesday.

He was speaking at the inauguration ceremony of a two-day conference organised by the Government College University (GCU) Lahore’s Centre for Excellence in China Studies (CECS) in collaboration with the Higher Education Commission (HEC) to explore economic, political, strategic, cultural and social dimensions of CPEC.

Experts from the United States, Belgium and United Kingdom as well as 20 Chinese academicians are participating in the conference.

“The Chinese government has not attached any conditions to the CPEC. This reflects the sincerity and depth of relations between the two countries,” he said.

The chief minister said that out of the $46 billion investment by China, $36 billion was going to be in the energy sector. “If everything goes well, 5,000 to 6,000 mega watts of electricity will be added to the national grid by 2017-18 as part of the project,” he said.

The chief minister also announced sending 300 students to China for higher education and for learning the Chinese language. “The Punjab government will invest Rs600 million in these students’ education,” he said.

“Today, I am standing in my alma mater. I talk as a proud Pakistani and a proud Ravian,” the CM said.

Shahbaz said that there was a huge potential for hydro power projects in Pakistan. “Unfortunately, both political governments and military regimes wasted time in this sector. Now, the government is focusing on building dams. The Neelam-Jhelum Dam is near completion. Land has been purchased for Bhasha Dam,” he said.

In his keynote address, Dr Akram Sheikh, the co-chair of NUST Global Think Tank Network and former Planning Commission deputy chairman, said the government needed to adopt a holistic, integrated, consultative, concentrated and coordinated approach to gain maximum benefits from the CPEC. He asked the government to add a railway network to the corridor. “The road network alone is not sustainable,” he said.

Sheikh said that there would be many mega projects, airports and new cities resulting from the CPEC. “A special authority should be immediately established to look after and coordinate these mage projects,” he said.

“Foreign interference and intervention in the form of terrorism, separatism, extremism in Pakistan’s soft belly, our capacity limitations and poor infrastructure are the major challenges to CPEC,” he said.

GCU Vice Chancellor Prof Hassan Amir Shah said they had a vision to transform CECS into a real think-tank for Sino-Pak relations. He called upon the Punjab chief minister, the HEC and the Chinese Consulate for their support for hiring permanent Chinese faculty at the university’s Centre for Excellence, China Studies.

In his inaugural speech, GCU CECS Director Dr Khalid Manzoor Butt said that the CPEC was a game-changer. “It will enhance Pakistan’s position in global politics. It will be more beneficial for Pakistan than Suez Canal has been for Egypt. Apart from political, economic and strategically advantages, it will also bring people of the two countries closer,” he said.

He said China was the biggest exporter in the world and the second biggest importer of oil. “This corridor will reduce to a third the distance needed to cover for reaching the Indian Ocean from China. It will also lessen the cost and prices of goods,” he said.

He said that Chinese experts attending the conference would present papers about the views of various countries of the world, including India, about the CPEC. He said a policy dialogue would also be held at the end of conference and its recommendations would be forwarded to the government.

Talking to the media later, Education Minister Rana Mashood Ahmed Khan appreciated the initiative of CPEC conference organisers. He said the government was really looking forward to the recommendations of academia and intellectuals to get maximum benefit from the mega project.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 10^th, 2015.