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Balochistan National Party (BNP-Mengal) President Sardar Akhtar Mengal on Wednesday said he will soon convene a central executive committee meeting of his party to take a final decision on whether or not to quit the coalition government over a lack of consultation prior to the passage of the Foreign Investment (Promotion and Protection) Act, 2022.
Lawmakers of both the BNP-M and the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (Fazl) boycotted a meeting of the federal cabinet earlier this week over the controversial legislation, saying they should have been consulted and their inputs incorporated prior to its passage in the Senate. While both parties have since returned to the cabinet, the BNP-M maintains that its frustration over the government’s operations persist.
Speaking with media, BNP-M Vice President Malik Wali Kakar rebutted earlier claims by Law Minister Azam Nazeer Tarar that the matter had been resolved, stressing that it was still proving a cause of contention. However, he added, federal minister Ayaz Sadiq had sought time for a meeting to clarify the situation and this would be considered after consultations with his party.
The issue at hand is the Foreign Investment (Promotion and Protection) Act, 2022, which the JUIF and BNP-M both wanted to restrict to the Reko Diq project for its revival. However, the law has been left open-ended, allowing for the same guidelines to be applied to any source of investment that the federal government designates as a “qualified investment.”
Meanwhile, the federal government is attempting to make amends through a cabinet committee that is negotiating with Mengal over his demands.
Last week, the Supreme Court declared a new deal between a Canadian mining firm and the government on the Reko Diq project as “legal”—including the law being used to facilitate the investment. Under the deal, Barrick Gold would resume operations at Reko Diq, with 50% ownership, while the remainder would be equally divided between the federal government and the Balochistan government. As a sop to the dissident coalition partners, the government is considering offering the provincial government a 35% stake, 10% higher than Islamabad’s new rate of 15% but it remains unclear if this has been deemed acceptable by the BNP-M.