‘FPCCI can turn around public corporations’

State-run units will be making profits within six months, say businessmen.

KARACHI: The Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI) has claimed that it can turn around loss-making public corporations and make them profitable within six months.

This was claimed by FPCCI President Sultan Chawla and former president Tariq Saeed during a press conference.

They asked the government to allow one individual, recommended by the FPCCI, from the private sector to be on the board of management of Pakistan Railways, Pakistan International Airlines, Pakistan Steel and Wapda amongst other public sector organisations.

Chawla and Saeed recommended that instead of ceding to the International Monetary Fund’s demands, the government should improve the performance of public corporations, reduce expenditures and adopt an austere approach to reduce the fiscal deficit.

Chawla also said that the country has the capability to produce 19,000 megawatts (MW) of electricity and the current demand is 14,000MW against an actual production of 10,000MW, which needs to be increased to near the actual capability to address the power crisis.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 17^th, 2010.