Dr Mubarakmand puts earning estimate at $321m for annum. PHOTO: FILE
Renowned scientist Dr Samar Mubarakmand said during a briefing to Balochistan Governor Nawab Zulfiqar Ali Magsi on Wednesday that the provincial government has won the Reko Diq case in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and will now implement the project.
“Work will first begin on 2.2 billion tonnes of ore and gold reservoirs worth $400 billion,” he said.
According to Dr Mubarakmand, the Geological Survey of Pakistan spotted the Reko Diq reservoirs in 1978 and an agreement was reached with Australian company Tethyan in 1993. Now, however, this agreement has come to an end and Balochistan has also won the case in the ICJ.
He further said that, under this project, as many as 15,000 tonnes of raw material will be excavated annually worth $411 million and government of Balochistan is expected to earn an annual profit of $321 million.
The provincial government allocated Rs1,400 million for this project whereas only the water supply will take Rs1,980 million, being completed in a span of a year and a half.
Furthermore, Dr Mubarakmand said the local people of Balochistan will be recruited for the project’s non-technical positions.
Balochistan Governor Magsi stressed upon a timely execution of the project so that the masses can benefit as soon as possible and directed both the chief secretary and the finance secretary to ensure an efficient provision of funds. Additionally, he, too, emphasised the need for the local people to be given more jobs, and for project offices to be established in Quetta instead of Islamabad.
Furthermore, Magsi directed the authorities concerned to guarantee foolproof security arrangements.
Published in The Express Tribune, January 31st, 2013.
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@Overseaspakistani:
Dr.Samarmubarak is a biggest con artist in Pakistan who is making a fool of everyone, so they can take all the funds for this project from the Govt and disappear. He has been already making a fool of everyone regarding Thar Coal project. Stop being so naive about Pakistani officials in uniform or civilian or politician to do anything good for Pakistan, eventually it will only happen with the help of multinational firms who has the technical expertise and cash to carry on all the exploration project. Pakistan Supreme Court decision will be one of their worst decision in the history of Pakistan. Pakistan courts have lost their credibility in the eyes of international business community. Everyone is after the money, even media has become the blackmailers of Pakistan. You can pay a journalist some money and he or she will write anything about anybody.
a Sorry Oversea Pakistani
Misleading article. The court has not ruled on the main dispute (which Balochistan is expected to lose) but simply indicated that it would not prevent Balochistan from development activities on a particular mining tract - it doesn't open the gates for massive development or even minor development on anything other than one small mining tract.
The problem with Pakistani elites is that it take speculations as realities and start beating drums and funny part is, poor volk is ever ready to dance on the beats of drum.End result is, as expected,nothing but dissappointment.
After all the hard work Dr. Somer and others will do to bring this project upto par, the politicians willl loot the gold and run to UK or USA. The poor will remain poor in Balochistan.
good to see this progress... i hope that people in Balochistan play a positive role and help security forces guard foreign or Punjabi/sindhi engineers who come here for this project.
this project will turns the cards around for Balochistan iA.
Good stuff, but the issue has always been Capex cost, imo, which could stall the project. Project finance for this is/was my main concern. As an overseas Pakistani, and someone who has made a living out of investing in mining companies, i salute the work of Dr Samar Mubarakmand. Hope this works out. This is a world class project, Not the biggest out there, But up there for sure.