Middle ground: Will not allow privatisation of state enterprises: Siraj

Jamaat-i-Islami Chief says his party is also against nationalisation

LAHORE:

Jamaat-i-Islami (JI) chief Sirajul Haq said on Tuesday that the party was against both, the nationalisation of privately held enterprises and the privatisation of public corporations.

The JI supremo made the remarks while addressing the central working committee of the National Labour Federation (NLF) at Mansoora. He said the government had no right to take over private property or hand over state-owned enterprises (SOEs). The JI, he said, had unflinchingly opposed nationalisation in the past. Similarly, he said, the party would vigorously oppose the government’s attempts to hand over national assets at throwaway prices to people of its choosing.

Haq said the government’s privatisation policy was completely devoid of transparency. He said the government was trying to sell profitable enterprises along with loss-making ones only to hoodwink the people. Haq said the government had deliberately kept the people and the parliament in the dark on account of dealings regarding privatisation.

The JI chief said the fact that workers of state-owned enterprises had not been taken into confidence over their planned privatisation spoke volumes about the lack of transparency. He said thousands of workers would be affected by such moves. Haq said no government in the world could afford to ignore workers when arriving at such decisions. He said, Pakistan was an anomaly in this regard, as its rulers thought that speaking to workers was beneath them.

Calling the privatisation of major state-owned enterprises including Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) and Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM) as mala fide and tyrannical, he said the government had been looking for an easy way out by putting them up for sale instead of revamping them for the better. Haq said the sale of PIA and PSM would wreak havoc on the national economy. The JI supremo said the party would never allow such a thing to take place. Haq called on the people to join the party’s anti-corruption drive to prevent the nation’s rulers from taking anti-national decisions. He said Pakistan Railways had witnessed a turnaround and PIA and PSM could also follow suit.

Separately, in a letter penned to the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa chief minister, the JI supremo urged the provincial government to allow the conduct of student union elections in the province. He said the Senate was unanimous in its support for allowing students to unionise. Haq said the ban on student union was unconstitutional and illegal. He said active student unions were the most effective check against terrorism. Haq said the KP government should take the lead in this regard.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 17^th, 2016.