The level of financial FUD in this article is horrible. Ad-hominem attacks on Shuakat Aziz, with no proper financial reasoning. Aziz *might* be a crook, but this article doesn't prove anything.
On Jan 14, 2008 8:58 AM, shiv sastry <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Needless to say, over the past > eight years banks have been more profitable than they had ever been. And > who > got screwed in the process? The average depositor, of course. Thank you, > Shaukat Aziz. > OK, maybe the average Pakistani depositor has been screwed. I don't know if she has. But banks becoming profitable does not automatically imply depositors being screwed. It's not a zero-sum game. > Yet, because of Shaukat Aziz's policies of providing cheap credit to one > and all, he can > be credited with selling more consumer electronics than any advertising > campaign. But if we weren't generating more power, how was the average > Pakistani supposed to run his fancy new air-conditioner and deep-freezer? > Today's power crisis, which is affecting both the consumer and the > industrial > user, can squarely be blamed on Shaukat Aziz's flawed economic policies. If credit *had* become cheap, it would have been cheaper to finance power projects too. If power wasn't added, that's presumably because the power sector wasn't liberalised enough. Which is bad. But saying that credit should flow to power projects before it flows to ordinary citizens who can use it to improve their quality of life (and cheap credit is used for many, many more reasons other than buying consumer electronics) smacks of elitism. There is an atta crisis in the land today and prices have spiralled out of > control > because Mr Aziz decided to allow the export of wheat as a political favour > a > little before he took off for London. According to news reports, a rice > crisis is also in the pipeline. Yeah, except food prices have increased worldwide. Can't really blame Aziz. > Our alternate energy policy is also one of the most backward in the > region. > Permissions to set up wind farms have been doled out to cronies and > political > allies like party favours. <snip> > Sweetheart deals all around for everyone. Sad, but we can thank the dream > team. This is probable, because it's a feature of energy politics in all countries. > Hiring a private banker to do the job of a policy economist is like > getting a plumber > to fix your car's engine. I do believe in divine justice and Shaukat Aziz > was > vying for Citibank's top job and was lobbying hard for it, yet the board, > instead, picked an Indian with an impeccable reputation. > Ah - two biases for the price of one - anti-banker and anti-Indian!
