Progress to date

Privatisation efforts began in earnest after the creation of Privatisation Commission on January 22, 1991. Although the PC mandate initially restricted to industrial transactions, by 1993 it had expanded to also include Power, Oil & Gas, Transport (aviation, railways, ports and shipping), Telecommunications and Banking and Insurance. During January 1991 to June 2009 the Commission completed 167 transactions for Rs 476.421 billion.

During the year under review, the Commission has realized an amount of Rs. 237.058 million on account of balance proceeds of Wah Cement Company, HBL (IPO) out of which Rs. 2.515 million were remitted to State Bank of Pakistan. As regard the balance amount, the requisite formalities are being completed in transmission to the Federal Government in accordance with the provision of PC Ordinance Rules thereunder.

To date, Government of Pakistan had completed or approved 167 transactions at gross sale price of Rs 476.421 billion. The sources of the proceeds have been shown in the figure 1. 

About 67% of the proceeds received were transferred to the Federal Government, 26% was returned to legal entities whose shares were sold, 5% was used for restructuring expenses associated largely with golden handshakes and rehabilitation, and 2% was used for PC’s privatisation-related expenditures (Figure 2).

While almost all the transactions were settled in local currency, about 66.3% of the proceeds have been received in foreign exchange from transactions pertaining to Kot Addu Power Plant (KAPCO), Oil & Gas Concessions, Habib Credit & Exchange Bank, United Bank Limited, Habib Bank Limited, KESC, PTCL, OGDCL and UBL. The table 2 provides the number of transactions privatised and sale proceeds received against these transactions.

Table 2: Number of privatized transactions

(Rs. in million)