'Riyadh pledged $20bn sans political intrusion'.

ISLAMABAD -- A former chairman of the Board of Investment (BoI) and member of Imran Khan's cabinet claimed on Monday that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, popularly known as MbS, wanted to invest $20 billion in Pakistan with a condition that the investment should be insulated from political and bureaucratic elite.

Haroon Sharif further claimed that during their meeting in 2019, MbS took him aside and said the Saudi government was committing $20bn in investment to Pakistan, but 'unless you insulate it from politics and bureaucracy this will not happen', he quoted the crown prince as saying.

Mr Haroon, who served as the BoI chairman during the PTI government, made these remarks while speaking at a Grand National DialAogue on 'Unlocking PakisAtan's EconoAmic Potential', organised by the Islamabad Policy Research Institute.

During his visit in 2019, MbS had pledged $20bn worth of investment in Pakistan to provide relief to the latter's struggling economy. According to the plan, the Kingdom intended to set up infrastructure, including an oil refinery. However, the said investment had not materialised yet.

Ex-BoI chairman claims Saudi crown prince expressed interest in investment during 2019 visit

Mr Sharif articulately made a case as to what was needed to 'rise from the ashes', and remarked that economies grew when the investment-to-GDP ratio rose, which he said was missing in the case of Pakistan. He said the future of world finance was in Asia, rather than Europe, mentioning the sovereign funds of Qatar, the UAE, Kazakhstan and China worth hundreds of billions of dollars, and advised that they needed to be tapped.

Speaking on the occasion, federal Minister for Planning and Development and Special Initiatives Ahsan Iqbal said Pakistan needed a long-term sustainable policy plan of action, one that should not be interrupted owing to political considerations. He said no investment could be sought 'until and unless we put our house in order, and that necessitates a consistent policy backed by all the stakeholders'.

He regretted that the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor...