Naguib Sawiris, an Egyptian billionaire, has reportedly expressed his will to invest in 100,000 housing units in Pakistan under the NPHP. The Ora Developers that Mr Sawiris owns is already engaged in the construction of a multi-billion-dollar housing scheme in Islamabad along with its local partners. So the construction company is no new to the place and the kind of work that needs to be undertaken as part of NPHP. In an interview given to a leading Saudi daily, a representative of Mr Sawiris says that the company wants to ‘do more’ and ‘invest more’ in Pakistan, expecting its investment in the country to come to $10 billion in the next 5 to 10 years.
Mr Sawiris’ will to help Prime Minister Imran Khan in his vision towards Pakistan is a heartening news. This reported Expression of Interest (EoI) will help the government tackle, to an extent, an acute shortage of housing units in the country which is currently estimated at 10 million units. But Mr Sawiris’ contribution to the NPHP — which is a gigantic five-million-homes project estimated to be twice as costly as the $50+ billion CPEC — in terms of the total number of housing units that he intends to build makes up 2%. And that means we need to have more and more Sawiris lending a helping hand for realising this colossal vision.
Published in The Express Tribune, January 22nd, 2019.
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