Loans Taken By Nawaz Government Will Be A Trouble For Pakistan In Future: Imran Khan
Loans Taken By Nawaz Government Will Be A Trouble For Pakistan In Future: Imran Khan: Addressing a press conference at a private hospital in the capital, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan condemned the PML-N government for mishandling the economic affairs of Pakistan and said that “Nawaz’s government took record loans”.
He said that former Finance Minister Ishaq Dar kept giving false impression that the country’s economy is improving and misreported the economic statistics. While criticizing Foreign Minister Khawaja Asif for holding Iqama, ha said that the foreign minister himself is taking pay from a foreign company.
PTI has been warning the government on privatizing of Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), Pakistan Steel Mills and other national assets. They have raised questions to Prime Minister on Finance and Economic Affairs Miftah Ismail’s announcement regarding the sale of PIA and Pakistan Steel Mills.
Short Glimpse of Loans Taken
Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) government breaking all records of taking foreign loans borrowed $40 billion from external sources during its 4 and a half years term. Pakistan has taken loans from commercial banks and International Monetary Fund (IMF), and through issuing bonds in international market, according to the official documents. Pakistan had borrowed $13.38 billion from the multilateral, $5.048 billion from bilateral, $6.7 billion from the commercial banks and $6.4 billion from the IMF by the end of September 2017. Similarly, the government has issued $6.5 billion Sukuk and Euro bonds in the international capital market during the last four years. They also borrowed $1.24 billion loan from external sources till November 2017. 50 % of the foreign loans were spent on the repayment of previous loans
The Situation of Domestic Debt is Even Worse
The volume of domestic debt has recorded a massive increase in the last four and half years. Net domestic debt stock went up to Rs13,510 billion by the end of September 2017 as against Rs8,686 billion in June 2013. The government borrowed domestic loans to bridge its budget deficit that is increasing due to missing tax collection as well as non-tax collection targets.
Pakistan faces an external financing gap of around $12 billion in the current fiscal year. Moody’s Investors Service on Wednesday has warned Pakistan of risks to its financial outlook on weak external account position and higher debt burden.
Imran Khan said that the country is in an economic mess because of the wrong policies of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) government. He further said that national reserves are on the decline and the loans taken by Nawaz Sharif would result in further burdening the economy.