By Rafiq Vayani
The “Election of The Federation of Pakistan Chamber of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI) are scheduled to be held on 29th December 2017 and United Business Group (UBG) with the support of business community nation-wide will sweep this time too, whereas opposition is relying mostly on blame game and trying their best at criticising the current office bearers”. This was stated by Mr. Hanif Gohar former Vice President of FPCCI and currently UBG’s Chief Co-Ordinator, Election Cell.
Mr. Hanif Gohar, Chairman of Gohar Group of Companies said; “opposition has too much internal difference between themselves and many among them are seeing each eye to eye and due to this very reason defeat of Businessmen Panel (BMP) and Pakistan business Group (PBG) seems evident. Due to so much difference among them the opposition is still unable to find suitable candidates to fill all 13 seats and right now only have 05 candidates, whereas UBG has very strong contestants and for all 13 seats”.
Replying to question UBG’s candidates for upcoming elections, Mr. Hanif Gohar said; “for FPCCI’s election UBG has fielded young and energetic businessmen from Khyber PukhtoonKha and their names of Mr. Ghazanfar Ahmad Bilour for President and for Senior Vice President Mazhar Ali Nasir and UBG’s candidates have the support of business community of Pakistan and they will succeed with heavy margin”.
UBG’s election campaign got under the enthusiastic and able leadership of Chairman Mr. Iftikhar Ali Malik and Patron in Chief S.M Munir and according to Mr. Hanif Gohar said; “92% voters are with us and we are hopeful of getting around 250 votes from all over Pakistan, and this elections seems a formality as I see many of UBG’s candidates winning unopposed”.
Speaking on performance of UBG he said; “UBG’s presidents Mian Muhammad Idress, Rauf Alam and existing President Mr. Zubair Tufail have performed tremendously and have been with business community at all levels. Since UBG entered FPCCI, it has brought down an era of corruption that had been persisting in FPCCI since long. FPCCI has also seen many positive changes during the tenure of headed by UBG and financial condition of FPCCI also improved drastically. When Mian Idress took over as the President, FPCCI was near default and when Mian Idress was stepping down their were around 60 million in bank account of FPCCI and with that amount construction of Capital Office Building was restarted which had been pending since last 10 years. Now with great leadership by Iftikhar Ali Malik, S.M. Munir, Abdul Rauf Alam, Zubair Tufail, Khalid Tawab, Aamir Ata Bajwa and efforts of many other office bearers now Capital Office Building is completed. Provident fund of employees has also been separated as it had been misused in the past.”
On success of UBG Hanif Gohar said; “Presidents of UBG have successfully organized three Achievement Awards and fourth Achievement Awards will be held on 16th December 2017. List of achievements by UBG is very long. FPCCI earned 60 million from Export Awards during last 3 years, from exhibitions another 60 million, organized first ever Pakistan International Trade Fair (PITF), most importantly FPCCI took the matter of taxes and refund of business community very seriously and aggressively and till now is continuously trying their level best with UBG leadership bearing travelin, boarding lodging expenses from pockets rather them from FPCCI accounts as done previously, for CPEC FPCCI is playing an important role by arranging seminars, doing research & development and giving brief suggestions to Federal Government. UBG has also played an active part in reviving female entrepreneurs and formed 13 sub-committees that were headed by female entrepreneurs and also included females in business delegations going abroad”.
