• Referring to PTI protests, finance minister says country loses Rs190 billion a day due to ‘strife or strike’
• PM pledges to ensure top-notch security for Chinese nationals in Pakistan
• Vows not to allow repeat of 2014, when PTI sit-in ‘derailed Xi Jinping’s visit’

ISLAMABAD: The Chinese nationals who lost their lives in a terrorist attack near the Karachi airport on Sunday night were in talks with senior government ministers regarding the renegotiation of terms for Independent Power Producers (IPPs), a top government minister revealed on Tuesday.

The remarks from Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb came as Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif vowed to make all-out efforts to ensure that Chinese nationals working in the country were “untouchable”.

Stressing that a peaceful and secure atmosphere was essential to attract foreign investment, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif also pledged not to allow a repeat of 2014, when a PTI sit-in had derailed a visit by Chinese President Xi Jinping.

In his remarks, the finance min­ister said that the slain men were IPP engineers, adding that he and his cabinet colleague Power Minister Awais Leghari had been negotiating with them and requesting them to “re-profile debt and extend the maturities” so Pakistan could reduce power tariffs to bring relief to the people.

“This was the Chinese IPP that had pledged to move forward with us, to create a win-win situation for both China and Pakistan. These are the people who stepped forward to help Pakistan, their senior management also flew from Beijing to move the process forward,” the minister said, expressing his condolences over the loss of lives and hoping that the dialogue with the Chinese would continue to move forward.

Talking about the situation created by the PTI’s strike call, which left major cities like Islamabad and Lahore virtually paralysed for days, Mr Aurangzeb said that the Ministry of Finance’s Economic Wing had calculated the adverse impact of such strife.

In their estimation, a single day’s strike could cause losses of around Rs190 billion to the economy.

This was in addition to the losses suffered by the social sector, i.e. people who could not get to hospitals or children who were unable to attend school; construction workers, street vendors and other daily wagers whose livelihoods were affected.

He estimated that, in the federal capital alone, around 800,000 families were affected by the strife.

PTI protest

Addressing the federal cabinet meeting, PM Shehbaz termed the latest PTI protests “a replica of the 2014 sit-in by the party”. “We will not allow it to be repeated. We will not tolerate it at any rate, at any cost. This is my promise. I will not let it happen,” he said.

He recalled that in 2014-15, a sit-in was staged for months and was not called off, despite the announcement of the Chinese president’s visit to Pakistan.

On the one hand, he said, the government was making efforts to stabilise the economy, while on the other hand, the KP chief minister was leading a group of saboteurs, Afghan nationals and government officials to cause unrest in Islamabad.

Allegations were being hurled against the government and attempts were being made to create chaos at a time when the Chinese premier is about to pay a visit and a Saudi delegation is scheduled to visit Pakistan, he said.

On Wednesday, the Finance Ministry issued a clarification and said that the Chinese engineers killed in Karachi’s terrorist attack were “not involved in independent power producer(IPP) talks with the government.”

Published in Dawn, October 9th, 2024