Money Drain, Brain Drain
Now that the Governor of the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has come clean and conceded to what was widely known, that there are no US dollars left in the kitty, the freeze on May 28 begins to make much more sense. Having invited our expatriates abroad to send their foreign exchange earnings to Pakistan, our government used up that money to live in a life of luxury that we could ill-afford. When Shahid Javed Burki took over as Caretaker Advisor on Finance in November 1996, Ms Benazir and company had cleaned out more than US$ 7 billion during their tenure. To stay afloat the Mian Nawaz Sharif regime has probably seen through the balance, as much as US$ 2 billion of the US$ 9 billion in Foreign Currency Accounts.
