National Logistics Corporation

National Logistics Corporation (NLC), an arm of the General Headquarters (GHQ) of the Pakistan Army, now plans to enter into lucrative power generation and transmission business in a rather big way.
An advertisement appearing in newspapers on July 21 calls for the pre-qualification of international and national companies by the NLC to undertake various activities related to thermal power generation, transmission lines of 66 kV and above, and grid station projects.
The areas identified include consultancy, manufacturing and supply of power plant machinery, operations and maintenance, engineering and procurement contract and civil construction etc.
Established in 1978 as a logistics cell under the Ministry of Communications to handle emergency freight, the NLC has grown, over a period of years, to a conglomerate itself. Currently the cell has multiple business interests, from freight services to construction jobs, operating dry ports and toll plazas, running a polymer plant and now oil, gas and power sectors.
Ironically, the corporation is not incorporated under the Companies Ordinance, thus not governed by the rules of the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP), and has not been placed under the tax net by the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR).
The NLC is entering into other new ventures too. Recently the federal government has entrusted it with the implementation of a ten-billion-rupee project for health and education services, which is funded by the Asian Development Bank (ADB). Also, it is reported that the NLC would be a major stakeholder in the Thar Coal Mining Company that has been formed recently by the federal government for exploitation of vast Thar coal deposits in Sindh, primarily for power generation. Of course, the NLC has no expertise, experience or qualification to manage a coal mining company.
To overcome its deficiency, the NLC intends to appoint international/national service companies specialising in the coal geology and mining. Consequently, consultants will be required to guide the NLC on all technical and management aspects related to the mining project. An advertisement to this effect was published in the newspapers of June 25.
On the one hand the government is divesting its companies operating successfully in strategic areas like oil, gas, heavy industries, power generation etc, and on the other it continues to allow the armed forces to reinforce its business empire at the cost of the exchequer. A new chapter needs to be added to Ayesha Siddiqa's recently published "Military Inc: Inside Pakistan's Military Economy".