The Economic Commission of the Cabinet approved the issuance of Rs9 billion rupees worth of standby credit for the Lahore-Sialkot Motorway. Sources report that in a meeting presided by Federal Finance Minister, Ishaq Dar, the committee decided to approve this credit. Reportedly the Lahore-Sialkot motorway product was being developed under a BOT (build-operate-transfer) contract at an estimated amount of 45.4 billion rupees and that this contract has already been awarded to FWO (Frontier Works Organisation.)
As per the agreement, the govt. of Pakistan is required to arrange a finance of 18 billion rupees to make this project viable. The Frontier Works Organisation is required to arrange about 21 billion rupees, while the National Highway Authority has to atone for 1.6 billion rupees as overhead expenses and about 5 billion rupees as a loan, outside the PSDP (Public Sector Development Programme.)
