Chairman of National Business Group Pakistan, President Pakistan Businessmen and Intellectuals Forum, All Karachi Industrial Alliance, and former provincial minister Mian Zahid Hussain said on Monday that the serious and economic crimes of the past had left the economy half dead. Now this patient will not get better with the help of medicine, but he needs emergency surgery, he said.

Mian Zahid Hussain said people have suffered from inflation, unemployment and economic decline for many years. But now their patience is waning, therefore steps to improve should be started quickly.

Talking to the business community, the veteran business leader said that due to inflation and unemployment, millions of people have gone below the poverty line, lawlessness has become a problem, and the issue of food security is becoming serious.

There is growing public anxiety which calls for immediate action, he said, adding that benefits should not be given to some of the influential groups in the name of reforms like in the past, but decisions should be made on merit.

Mian Zahid Hussain said that taxes should be levied on sectors that do not pay taxes; government should get rid of failed companies, improve the system of subsidies and refunds, increase exports and decrease imports, and forgive existing taxpayers.

The business leader observed that new departments are being created rapidly, which is a joke with the country’s resources and the poor people.

He noted that dozens of departments have no work. In contrast, many different departments have been given the same responsibilities, which is like playing with the country’s resources, so central and provincial governments should reduce their size.

Mian Zahid Hussain said that if the drama continued instead of real reforms, the country will become bankrupt, the value of the rupee would fall further, inflation will hit the country, the banking system will collapse, the demand for dollars would increase, and the share of the undocumented economy will grow.

Many countries have achieved the goal of self-reliance in a few years, with fewer resources than Pakistan, because in these countries, the distribution of resources and awarding of influential people in the name of reforms was stopped for the sake of national development.