Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif on Tuesday said there was a need for collective wisdom and concerted efforts to cope with the internal and external challenges besetting the country.
Addressing the members of executive committee of All Pakistan Newspapers Society who met him under the leadership of President Sarmad Ali, Shahbaz said leaders of all political parties and stakeholders would have to sit together and evolve a new agenda to safeguard national interests.
He said the new national agenda should be aimed at protecting Pakistan’s sovereignty and integrity as well as the interests of the people of all regions of the country.
The Punjab chief minister said Pakistan could not progress unless terrorism and extremism were completely rooted out. He said a unanimous national policy would have to be adopted for coping with terrorism, promotion of economic activities and overcoming power crisis.
He said the energy crisis had caused an irreparable loss to national economy in general and Punjab’s economy in particular. He said due to unjustified load shedding, Punjab had suffered a loss of Rs 300 billion to its economy in one year and of $1 billion in exports.
He said instead of hankering after rental power projects during the last four years, had the rulers paid attention to generation of energy from coal and other economical sources of power generation, the country would not have been immersed in darkness.
Senator Pervaiz Rashid, Punjab Law Minister Rana Sanaullah and Information Secretary Mohyuddin Ahmad Wani were also present.
The APNS president informed the chief minister about the problems being faced by national and regional newspapers. Felicitating the newly-elected members of the executive committee of APNS, Shahbaz said press was the fourth pillar of the state and the persons associated with this sector were playing an important role in highlighting social and economic issues.
He also issued instructions for the payment of the outstanding dues of advertising agencies and newspapers by May 20 and assured that the problems faced by newspapers and journalists will also be resolved as soon as possible.
Referring to the power crisis, he said the problem of shortage of energy in the country was the result of non-serious attitude as well as corruption and inept policies of the rulers.
He said Pakistan’s overall exports were about $26 billion per annum whereas it has to spend a huge amount of $10 billion annually on the import of oil. He said due to unavailability of electricity and corruption of the rulers, foreign investment in Pakistan has declined.
He said the circular debt of rental power plants had reached the figure of Rs 400 billion due to which international investors were reluctant to invest in Pakistan. He said Punjab was the main target of load shedding and was a victim of economic exploitation.
He said it was lamentable that the decisions of energy conference had not been implemented.
He said that for the purpose of unanimous approval of National Finance Commission Award, Punjab, under the spirit of national integrity, had surrendered Rs 11 billion of its share but a uniform policy on load shedding was not being adopted in the country.
