Civil Society backs Senate’s resolution for debt waiver

KARACHI: The Civil Society representatives of the country have sough implementation on the Upper House’s resolution for writing off of the foreign debts.
In a letter sent to the Senate Chairman Farooq H Naek, the signatories, who had attended the Pakistan Development Forum meeting this month, expressed concerns over the Finance Minister Hafeez Shaikh’s disowning of the call for debt waiver, Pakistan Today learnt on Sunday.
He had said both during the Forum and subsequently as an advice to the
PDF that “no wise man will ask for debt write-off.”
The signatories in their letter have pointed out that the Pakistan Development Forum was informed about the Senate’s position through Senator Rehman Malik’s call for waiving the foreign debts of over $50 billion
“But ‘ill-informed and arrogant is Dr Shaikh’s contention that debt waiver would render Pakistan a pariah state without future recourse to international capital,” the letters reads.
They said defending the additional foreign debts was an ‘amazing ignorance’ about the widespread poverty. “In fact, the country needs less indebtedness, and the Senate resolution also emphasises the same fact, more of equity investment and fair trade.
As Finance Minister and Co-Chair of the Forum, his position implies very serious defiance of the Senate resolution. Also alarming is the absence of wisdom in high levels of policy making,” the letter further said.
They commended the unanimous resolution of 123rd Inter-Parliamentary Union (Geneva, October 6, 2010)
and said our Senate deserves deep appreciation for its unanimous adoption of a resolution.
The signatories of the letter include Karamat Ali Chairperson, Sungi Development Foundation and Executive Director, Pakistan Institute of Labor Education and Research, Mohammad Tahseen, Executive Director SAP-Pk Lahore, Sarwar Bari Pattan Development Foundation, Dr. Farzana Bari, Chairperson, Women Study Center, Quaid-i-Azam University, Abdul Khaliq Shah of Pakistan Debt Cancellation Campaign, Dr Shaikh Tanveer Ahmed (Health and Nutrition Development Society), Maryam Bibi of Khwanda Kor and Dr Abid Suleri (Executive Director, Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI).