ISLAMABAD: The Privatisation Commission board on Thursday approved the transaction structure (TS) for revival of Pakistan Steel Mills Corporation (PSMC), which has not been operational since June 2015. TS approval was agreed in principal and FA was asked to move ahead with procedural follow-up processes expeditiously. TS will be presented to the Cabinet Committee of Privatization (CCOP) for approval.
The board meeting, chaired by federal minister for Privatisation, Muhammadmian Soomro, discussed status of hiring of financial advisory consortium for Roosevelt Hotel, Guddu Power plant and Sindh Engineering Limited and offloading of OGDCL and PPL shares,
The terms of reference (TORs) for hiring of financial advisors (FAs) for Roosevelt Hotel, owned by PIA were also deliberated upon in the meeting.
The board also discussed divestment of up to 10% of GOP shares in Pakistan Petroleum Limited (PPL) and up to 7% shares in OGDCL. After extensive discussion on transaction fundamentals, market conditions and pros and cons of various options the board decided: PC to proceed for hiring of financial advisors consortium (FAC) for divestment of 10% of GOP shares in PPL. Moreover, proposals from FAC will be obtained for documented as well as undocumented modes of transactions, the process for FAC hiring for OGDCL will commence once the hiring of FAC for PPL is completed.
The board decided to re-invite the EOIs for hiring of FAs for the privatisation of Guddu Power Plant due to exorbitant financial bid submitted by the top rank consortium earlier. The board also decided to re-invite EoI for the appointment of fFinancial advisors consortium (FAC) for privatisation of Sindh Engineering Limited (SEL). The previous shortlisted top ranked consortium was insisting on changes to the agreed financial services agreement, including changing the transaction scope and payment terms which could not be accepted by Privatisation commission. The board considered WAPDA- owned property in Swat, KPK; and finally decided referring the matter to CCOP. The auction of properties owned by the federal government will start from September 7, 2020.
Federal Minister Privatisation said, Privatization Commission is fully geared up in achieving the objective of expediting the privatization of State own Enterprise to mitigate the drain of these enterprises on the government budget. This is the seventh transaction Approved since the start of the Privatization plans adopted in October 2018 and Privatization Commission will be focusing to complete these transactions successfully along with other transactions which are currently in progress.