The House Building Finance Corporation Limited taking strong exception to a news item published in Business Recorder of November 29, 2010 under the heading "Rs 11.952bn irregularities detected in HBFC accounts," has issued following clarification:
7) HBFCL is dismayed that such a news story filed and printed without seeking HBFCL's viewpoint, a procedure which any responsible journalist would have followed.
8) HBFCL is also surprised that the news item is allegedly based on a highly confidential government document that has not yet been published or made public.
9) The news item misrepresents the facts and uses inappropriate financial terminology. The word 'irregularities' suggests wrongdoing whereas the fact is that the amount of Rs 11.968 billion is 'Receivable' from HBFCL's customers, which is not an irregularity and is the normal course of mortgage loan business. Further, it may be noted that in past 3 years, HBFCL has actually recovered an amount of about Rs 10 billion.
10) The news item further shows complete lack of professionalism as in the third paragraph it states that "the State Bank of Pakistan imposed a penalty of Rs 1.335 million on HBFCL and then a little later in the same paragraph, the figure is given as Rs 1.335 billion. Furthermore, the assertion that the SBP has debited HBFCL is a blatant fabrication. Such sensationalism and irresponsible reporting is highly damaging and creates a totally misleading perception of all named stakeholders.
11) All the appointments and purchases referred to in the news item were approved by the Board of HBFCL, which is fully authorised by the government to take such decisions.
12) There are other issues raised in the news item which are also highly contentious and based on wrong or misrepresentation of the facts and HBFCL desires Business Recorder to clarify all issues and present the correct facts to its readers.
Our reporter states: The news story is based on report of the Director Commercial Audit & Evaluation, Government of Pakistan - submitted to the Secretary Ministry of Finance - for inclusion in the next Auditor General's report on Public Enterprises. However, the typo error pointed out in the Para 10 of the clarification is correct.-PR