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ISLAMABAD (ANN/DAWN) – Finance Minister Ishaq Dar is seeking financial support in Abu Dhabi, including by selling minority stakes in state-owned companies listed on the stock market at negotiated prices.
On the first day of his visit, Dar met with top executives of multi-billion dollar public sector entities – such as Abu Dhabi’s state-owned holding company ADQ, International Holding Company (IHC) and Etisalat – to discuss plans in Pakistan. Investment Opportunities.
Dar’s visit is expected to continue today, followed by Prime Minister Sheikh Baz Sharif’s visit to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) shortly after taking office in April and asking the UAE leadership for a new loan of $2-3 billion.
The Prime Minister was assured that the UAE’s leading state-owned enterprises and sovereign wealth funds could choose between 10% and 15% stakes in listed companies, with the option to buy back from the Pakistani government and have their nominees join the board as part of the professionals. business relationships rather than direct loans.
Since 2019, the UAE has provided Pakistan with more than $2 billion in loans, most recently in March, another year. However, the authorities have been seeking greater support given Pakistan’s limited foreign exchange reserves. Things have not progressed since Sharif’s visit on May 1, mainly because the Pakistani government was unable to get parliament to pass a proposed law to allow the sale of the state-owned company’s share base in a negotiated government-to-government (G2G) deal.
For the same reason, similar proposals from Qatar have so far failed to materialize, save for the slow progress of Qatar Gas’s proposed LNG terminal near Karachi.
Dar met ADQ and IHC chief executives Mohammed Al-Suwaidi and Syed Basar in Abu Dhabi and discussed investment opportunities in Pakistan, an official statement said.
The companies “expressed particular interest in investing in energy, agriculture, healthcare and other sectors,” the statement said.
Likewise, a delegation from Etisalat also met with the Minister of Finance and briefed him on its ongoing operations in Pakistan and future business plans.
The company will hold the US$800 million sale proceeds of Pakistan Telecom Limited (PTCL) for 15 years. Pakistan is weighing the rollout of next-generation telecom licenses.
The government recently introduced a new piece of legislation in the National Assembly, the Intergovernmental Commercial Transactions Act 2022, to provide “mechanisms for conducting commercial transactions under the Intergovernmental Framework Agreement to facilitate, attract and encourage foreign ownership of the economy and cooperation with Pakistan. business relationship”.
This is to ensure an inflow of $2-3 billion from the UAE through the sale of shares in state-owned companies with debt, with the option to buy back these shares at a time Pakistan chooses, as the existing privatisation law does not provide for negotiated G2G deals and the UAE also reluctant to participate in the bidding.
The UAE already made a similar investment in Egypt earlier this year and hopes to replicate the experience in Pakistan.
Pakistan looks to ADQ, IHC and other companies such as Mubadala Investment Company and Abu Dhabi National Oil Company to invest in listed entities in its oil and gas sector.
While the Egyptian deal has been completed, Islamabad authorities have been unable to make any progress.
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