President gets over $1b UAE commitment

ISLAMABAD - Pakistan’s plan ‘A’ for economic revival appeared to have started working after International Monetary Fund’s approval, in principle, of a bail out programme and the government’s concerted efforts to seek bilateral financial help.
According to well-placed sources, President Asif Ali Zardari on his way back from Saudi Arabia purposefully extended his private visit to United Arab Emirates (UAE) contrary to the media reports that claimed he returned home Thursday.
The sources said the President also summoned Prime Minister’s Advisor on Finance Shaukat Tarin to assist him in convincing the rulers of the UAE to extend either balance of payment credit or direct liquidity support to stabilise both Pakistan’s current account and the currency.
According to the sources, the UAE leadership during the meetings with Zardari and his economic aides has agreed to provide financial assistance to Pakistan one way or the other to the tune up over a billion dollars. The assistance package from UAE would include bilateral credit and liquidity support directly to the State Bank of Pakistan through the central bank of UAE.
Counting on commitments made initially by the Saudi Arabia and later on by the UAE together with high hopes drawn from the President’s visit to China, senior officials at the Finance Ministry now believe that the Plan ‘A’ has also started working. Earlier it was clear perception both in the official and the private circles that both the Plan ‘A’, of bilateral and market support, and Plan ‘B’, Friends of Pakistan consortium, could only work if the Plan ‘C’, an IMF programme, matures.
“If Pakistan gets four billion dollars commitments from Saudi Arabia and over a billion dollars’ from UAE actualised and almost an equal amount if not more from China, it may not be needing the IMF,� a senior official observed requesting anonymity. However, he rushed to add that still Pakistan would not be in a position to say ‘no’ to IMF because the Fund’s prescriptions were required even for seeking bilateral support for budgetary make up or balance of external payments.