Pakistan asked for the consent of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to impose a new tax on the capital territory to finance a medical complex of 213 billion rupees, because Islamabad has trouble finding tax roads to finish the project in the three years. As an alternative, the government also plans to exhaust the budget emergency basin to release at least 30 billion rupees immediately to start working on the complex mega, which will house 1,000 beds as well as advanced medical facilities, according to government sources. They added that the Ministry of Finance had approached the IMF to approve a new municipal tax to collect funds to build the Jinnah medical complex and research center in Islamabad. The project provides for the construction of a tertiary care establishment with 1,000 beds, organized in several Supra specialty medical centers (COES). They also said that in response to Pakistan’s request, the IMF had asked for more details. A Mission of the IMF also arrives in Islamabad on September 25 to start talks for the publication of the third branch of $ 1 billion, subject to the completion of the second review of the economy. The IMF team will remain in Islamabad until October 8. However, the coalition government pushes the project on a fast lane to finish it by July 2028, added the sources. They declared that the government had also started working on alternative options, in particular obtaining additional grants from the budget or funds diverted from other projects. When contacted, the Minister of Planning and Development, Ahsan Iqbal, said that the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) had formed a committee to resolve the financing constraints that the project is confronted by exploring alternative modes to finance it. IQBAL said that it would recommend funding the project outside the Public Sector Development Program (PSDP). The Minister said the government had provided initial seed funds of around 3.5 billion rupees, which will be used to set up the Jinnah Medical Complex and the hiring staff to supervise the project. The Minister of Planning will chair the Committee, which will also supervise the physical progress of the project and ensure its completion within the stipulated period. The other members of the Committee include the secretaries of the ministries of national health, planning and finance services. The government is facing competing requests from various ministries and state organizations, as the Federal Development Financing Basin was considerably reduced to only 0.8% of GDP compared to the summit of 3% a few years ago. Sources said the government also planned to use $ 76 million, RS21.5 billion, in the expected product of Panda Obligations to finance the Jinnah medical complex. However, the Ministry of Finance insisted that the RS21.5 billion should be treated as part of the PSDP of RS1 billion for this exercise instead of being exploited as a source of additional financing. The Central Development Working Party (CDWP) had examined the project, where the Ministry of Health declared that additional funding would be provided by Panda Obligs, the contributions of social responsibility of companies of companies belonging to the government and municipal taxes of the Islamabad capital territory. The CDWP had ordered the Ministry of Health to strengthen a detailed financing mechanism for the project, incorporating the financing needs offered through these sources. However, without firm commitments, the government submitted the project at the ECNEC meeting, but the question of the mobilization of RS213 billion in three years remained unanswered, the sources said. The officials of the Ministry of Planning said that for the moment, there was no concrete commitment and that the indicative amounts of these non -PSDP sources had been provided by the Ministry of Health to date. The Jinnah Medical Complex Company also looked for funds to buy five vehicles for the project, but the Ministry of Planning qualified the unfair demand against the development budget. According to project documents, the complex will be a 15 -story building near the new Islamabad international airport. The project should be completed in two phases. Phase I is offered to be completed within 30 months from the release of funds, while phase II should be completed in two years. The government argues that the national average of Pakistan is five hospital beds for 10,000 people, against 16 in India and a range of 9 to 22 in other neighboring countries in the region. The construction of hospitals in the public sector has not followed the pace of population growth, with few new installations built since 1985. The population of Islamabad has gone considerably from 246,000 in 1984 to almost 1.3 million in 2024. This increase in the fivefold over four decades created a significant increase in the demand for health services.
Govt is looking for a nod of the IMF for a new tax
