Over 200 FIRs Filed Against Real Estate Firm Bidding on PIA

Blue World City is the only company to meet the criteria for bidding on a stake in Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), the nation’s flagship carrier.

Blue World City is a real estate development located near Rawalpindi and Islamabad. There are “almost 215 FIRs registered against the company owners with charges ranging from murder, illegal weapons, injuring people, and illegal occupation of land,” according to reporter Shahid Aslam.

The Privatization Commission had already shortlisted six bidders. These were Fly Jinnah, which was led by YB Holdings (Pvt) Ltd, Airblue Ltd, which was managed by Pak Ethanol (Pvt) Ltd, Arif Habib Corporation Ltd, and Blue World City.

It was also alleged that government officials initially did not consider Blue World City, a real estate corporation, to be a serious competitor for PIA.

After a thorough review based on technical, financial, and documentary requirements, the Commission chose the six companies and invited them to move on to the next step of the bidding process to begin buy-side due diligence.

Although there were six qualified bidders, only one decided to put in “earnest money” before the final bidding. Earnest money is a deposit provided to a seller to show the buyer’s good faith in making a deal.

Upon winning the bid, the winning company would control 51% of PIA and have full ownership of the airline’s stock.

Blue World City Targets Islamabad Airport Amid PIA Privatization

According to the Business Recorder, Blue World City’s owner was also considering buying the airport’s operations, since the government wants to hire someone else to run them.

As required by the IMF for structural changes, the government chose to privatize PIA because it had lost more than Rs 75 billion in 2023.

PIA owes about Rs800 billion ($2.9 billion), and the government has had to help it out of debt several times over the years.

Shahid Aslam, a journalist, also said that the people in charge of Blue World City also own Suno TV. Aslam says that the Blue World City is now run by “retired Generals (Arif Waraich and Sajjad Rasool) who served in ISI.”

“Gen (retd) Arif Warraich served as the DG SCT (ISI) from 2014 to 2015, and is now a Director in Suno TV’s management,” Aslam said. Gen (retd) Sajjad Rasool, on the other hand, was DGS Security & Administration in ISI and is now a member of the core management team at Suno TV.