Chasing investment

THERE is something about private investment that successive governments in Pakistan have failed to understand. Promoting private investment is a bit like catching a bird. You cannot chase after it because that makes it nervous and it most likely will fly away. You have to lay out what it seeks then wait for it to come. For the third time this year, our government has gone running to another country to ask for investment. In May, we had headlines announcing that the UAE had agreed to invest $10 billion in Pakistan, during a visit by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif. Then this June, Sharif led a large delegation of Pakistani businessmen (and yes, they were all men so no need for gender-neutral language here) to China in the hopes of inking an equally large number of business deals. All they came back with, sadly, was a handful of MoUs.