By: Dr. Jumma Marri Baloch

News about fresh research reports put out by Top line Securities, that states that Pakistan will have to repay $90 billion on CPEC investments of $50bn. The report itself is sound, and the figure of $3.5bn per year as repayment obligations are very high such huge payments poor Pakistani economy will certainly not be able to sustain hence will end up in never lasting Chinese debts.

China Pakistan so called economical corridor is nothing but a cunning Chinese trap it’s a huge loan given to Pakistan by Chinese state owned bank that Pakistan have to repay with huge percentages all benefits of this project will flow back to China.

For examples all infrastructure projects are Chinese owned and all the workers will be brought in from China to implement these projects, these projects costs are gold plated to account for both bribes for Punjabi political elites and army generals in Rawalpindi, to ensure that the windfall gains goes back to Chinese.

The CPEC will have great strategic importance for China this is because of the access it allows western China to the Indian Ocean, as an alternative to the straits of Malacca. It also gives China a presence in India’s neighborhood and in western Asia.

Admittedly CPEC is not quite the corridor of opportunities but rather long term enslavement voluntarily accepted by Punjabi political and army elites and permanent dependence on China, many of these projects are financially unviable and expensive. The power plants it is building will require tariffs that most Pakistani cannot sustain. CPEC follows similar patterns of the white elephant Sri lanka has been saddled with.

Whether CPEC will bring any benefits to people of Pakistan or not it will surely enrich few greedy political leaders and army generals who willingly signed on to this Chinese strategic blueprint as in the past in case of another superpower it has happily sacrificed its country’s realizable, long term interests for personal benefits and in the services of an external benefactor.

CPEC is an existential threat to Baloch nationhood, it will alienate Baloch people and it will create permanent opposition and sources of instability and conflict.

CPEC will be opposed by America along with her allies in NATO who will feel their influences endangered in entire Asian continent and in particular Oil rich Middle East.    

CPEC will passes through disputed Indian territories that will provoke India to counter it, this project will give little and take much more and make Pakistan a Chinese colony heavily indebted, and CPEC will uproot Pakistan and will be the source of her breakup.

Pakistani politician and army generals who look only for their personal interests and who have already shifted their capital in Swiss banks and bought and buying huge properties from Dubai, London, Europe and North America hardly care for ordinary people of Pakistan they are simple traders, they will trade as long as it’s possible. It’s the Pakistani people who will have to pay for their blunders later.