The Senate Standing Committee on Saturday expressed reservations over the draft ‘The Special Economic Zones Bill, 2010’, saying the proposed legislation might be misused by the wealthy industrialists and it did not serve the purpose of generating more jobs for the people of the country.
The committee met with Senator Kazim Khan in the chair at the parliament house. Senators including Jehangir Badar and Saeeda Iqbal of the PPP and Syed Zafar Ali Shah of PML-N feared that the proposed law might be misused by the industrialists and that it will harm the interests of the established industry.
Badar asked the BOI Chairman Saleem Mandiwala to remove obstacles in foreign investment instead of going for the new experiment.
However, the BOI chairman told the committee that these hurdles could not be removed due to interest of several ministries involved in it. He said the SRO culture caused irreparable loss to the national industry and added that a permanent legislation in this regard would improve the situation a lot.
When told that state land obtained on lease could also be used to establish SEZs, Badar said that would lead to a race among the wealthy for acquisition of state land on lease. He proposed that at least those industries which are not generating jobs for common people like the LPG industry must be excluded from tax exemption.
