Islamabad : May 11 , 2024 : As Pakistan begs for another package with bigger in bowl size and for extended time , an advance team of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has set broader outlines for Shahbaz government to qualify for $ 8 billion loan.
According to media reports quoting Finance ministry sources , IMF advance team currently going through data made available to it by the government departments has conveyed to the authorities that Pakistan has to load another Rs 1400 billion taxes in next budget on tax payers mostly salaried class . Islamabad has also been told by IMF advance team that it has to say goodbye to the culture of tax exemptions amenity schemes and supplementary budgetary grants. IMF is also pushing Pakistan to bring entire business chain in tax net besides taxing agri income . The fund is demanding Pakistan to add another Rs 100 billion tax in the next budget on the commuters as petroleum levy . Pakistan is also going to get another demand of taxing pensions in the next budget.
IMF had approved a $ 3 billion dollar bailout under a 9-month Stand By Arrangement (SBA) and that too after go ahead of the Saudi government. The fund disbursed 3 billion dollar to Pakistan on Riyadh’s guarantee. Now Islamabad is again in the line of begers of IMF. Islamabad is looking for a long term loan from IMF to stablise its economy . Pakistan is living on loans for years . Its rulers, instead formulating a home grown economic revival policy, believes that IMF ‘s loans could save Pakistan’s from a complete collapse. Prime minister , Shahbaz Sharif , himself repeatedly acknowledged in the public in the last couple of months that Pakistan has only one option of IMF to avoid a complete economic meltdown . Interestingly , the same Shahbaz Sharif who was tirelessly trying to convince to the people of this country that his last government worked day and night for 16 months to save Pakistan from an imminent default on foreign loans payments . Now he is declaring that IMF ‘s another loan programme is a last option to save Pakistan from a complete economic meltdown . Prime minister Shahbaz Sharif is in so love for another IMF loan programme that he did not forget to tell to the world top world leaders at the World Economic Forum (WEF) held in Riyadh a couple of weeks ago that Pakistan is a complete failure in economic terms . He informed to the world leaders at that event that nobody pays power bills in Pakistan as corruption is rampant in his country. Thanks he forgot to mention in his historic speech made at WEF that his party has played a key role in its four terms innpowe bto push Pakistan into debt trap and his government is entangling it even more badly by seeking one after another loan programme from IMF.
