Tarar condemns PTI for jeopardising national interests

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Attaullah Tarar on Thursday criticised the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), stating that individuals involved in last year’s May 9 attacks are now jeopardising national interests.

Speaking to the media, Tarar emphasised that those who undermined the country’s interests were adversaries of Pakistan.

He expressed dismay at prioritising political agendas and ego over national interests, highlighting the regrettable pattern of the PTI leadership disowning statements against the country’s interests.

Tarar noted that the PTI leaders were embroiled in corruption cases, lamenting that enemies of Pakistan struggle to accept investments in the country. He prayed for divine guidance for such individuals to speak in the country’s favour, the official news agency reported.

The minister condemned the actions stooping to anti-national levels, stressing that while criticism of the government and its policies is acceptable, criticising Pakistan is intolerable.

He acknowledged the support of friendly countries in investing and cooperating with Pakistan, expressing optimism for progress with Allah’s grace.

Attaullah Tarar also affirmed Pakistan’s commitment to strengthen relations with friendly countries.

Meanwhile, Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Attaullah Tarar on Thursday stressed the need for enhanced collaboration between the public and private sectors to fast track the process of economic development of the country.

Addressing the First Pakistan Semiconductor Summit, he said that the Special Investment Facilitation Council had been set up to attract investment in Pakistan and ensure “ease of doing business”.

He said it was the main thrust of the government policy to encourage innovation and investment in the country.

He said that Pakistan, as the fifth largest democracy in the world, was endowed with great natural resources and its biggest resource was its human resource. “We are blessed with a huge population of youth which constitutes 68 percent of our population. That is a huge potential which we can offer to the world,” he added.

He said Pakistan was strategically located at the crossroads of the world which was a source of pride for the nation.

Tarar said that the Government of Pakistan as a policy encouraged innovation and investment in the country which this summit was offering precisely – a collaboration between public and private sector.

He said that the federal cabinet meeting on Wednesday had approved a public-private partnership policy framework to eventually facilitate investment in the country.

He said that the job of the government was not only to regulate but also to facilitate investment. He said unfortunately sometimes governments forgot their primary responsibility as a facilitator which hampered the investment.

He said that the government could fulfil this responsibility through collaboration between public and private sector and by ensuring “ease of doing business”.

He said that Pakistan has been producing 50,000 engineering graduates every year and it has the best engineering universities in the world. “Our engineering graduates are well placed globally but unfortunately we are not able to reap the benefits of the semiconductor industry. It is a $550 billion industry at this moment with the projection of $1 trillion by 2030.”

Tarar said that Pakistan had great potential to deploy its human resource in this industry.

The minister said that he was proud to inform that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif during his stints as chief minister of the Punjab had attached great importance to vocational training and skill development. From day one, the priority of the PML-N was skill development of the youth.

“The manifesto of the political party that I represent highlights the importance of enhancing skills and placing importance on skill development, on setting up institutes where skills training is imparted to youth and this is the way forward,” he said.

Expressing gratitude to founder and CEO of GS Microelectronics (GSME) Farhat Jahangir, he said he had done a great job by organising this summit to bring public and private sectors together and bringing members of esteemed universities of Pakistan under one roof for optimum collaboration.

The information minister urged the luminaries from leading universities to come up with workable solutions and tangible proposals. He assured that the government would be on the forefront in these endeavours.

Saying that several discussions have been held on semiconductor business, he expressed the optimism that it would be from chip designing to providing skill development to enhancing research in development and planning,

Tarar said Pakistan had a lot of expertise in skill development as well as research and development, adding though research and development was one area with regard to chip designing, Pakistan could contribute immensely in this regard.

“I hope one day we may develop some capacity towards manufacturing (semiconductors) after a few years,” he said. “However, there was a need to set a direction, and set an objective and goal.”

He added that the experts in the summit who had spent decades in this field could guide the way forward.

Thanking the forum for hosting the event, he hoped that collaboration in this sector would continue and Pakistan could be linked with the global economy. “This is something we need to emphasise and focus on which will help our economy in a big way as the world is opening up,” he opined.

He said since coming to power this year, the present government had received many delegations from abroad. “We just hosted a Saudi Arabian delegation a few days ago and the Iranian President is due next week, so there are a lot of positive activities.”

Tarar said that economic indicators were positive and international financial institutions and international financial journals were unanimous that Pakistan had great potential for economic development. “If we put our heart into it, the sky is the limit; and with good intentions, we set on this path,” he said.