Federal cabinet has no power to privatize Steel Mills: Raza Rabbani

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) senior leader Mian Raza Rabbani on Saturday said that the federal cabinet has no power to privatize Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM), ARY News reported.

Talking to journalists, Raza Rabbani said that the federal cabinet exceeded its constitutional power by including PSM in the privatization list.

He maintained that the incumbent has no clear policy about the steel mills, adding that Prime Minister Imran Khan had also opposed privatization of the mills. The former Senate chairman said that Imran Khan had promised to restore PSM during his election campaign.

Raza Rabbani said that the Supreme Court had restrained the government from privatization of PSM in Musharraf’s tenure.

It is pertinent to mention here that Minister for Privatisation Mohammad Mian Soomro on January 29 had said that Pakistan Steel Mills was among six public sector entities to be sold off this year.

Addressing a press conference, he had said the government was expecting to earn Rs150 billion non-tax revenue from the privatisation of six loss-making public sector entities (PSEs) by June 30.