The Pakistan Economy Watch (PEW) has expressed concern over slow pace of reforms which has left government with little options but to seek costly loans and burden existing taxpayers.
The improvement in economic indicators has little to do with reforms and more to do with IMF loans, bond issues and substantial decrease in oil prices, President PEW Dr Murtaza Mughal said.
He said the government has not shown any notable progress in reducing budget deficit, broaden tax net, improvement in energy sector, autonomy to central bank, and taking loans from banks within limits and restructure bleeding state-run corporations.
Dr Mughal said the government continues to ignore necessary reforms in the FBR and burden existing taxpayers which will not serve its purpose of improving revenue collection, rather, it would increase tax evasion.
He lashed out at getting costly loans to repay the earlier loans terming it a trap as already taken loans are equal to 67 percent of the GDP. He advised economic managers to stop implementing short-term measures. It would further harm the economy in the long run.
Mughal said that costly and non-transparent projects like Nandipur, Solar Park and import of LNG will not resolve energy crisis but worsen miseries of the masses.