Abu Dhabi, UAE – The Pakistan Business Professional Council (PBPC) Abu Dhabi organized a webinar in collaboration with the Embassy of Pakistan UAE and State Bank of Pakistan on Thursday, 15th October 2020, and highlighted Pakistan’s first presence-less account opening through the Roshan Digital Account

Dr. S. Qaiser Anis, President Pakistan Business Professional Council Abu Dhabi

Dr. S. Qaiser Anis, President of Pakistan Business Professional Council Abu Dhabi and moderator of the webinar, opened by welcoming and thanking the participants and speakers for attending.

“The Council supports the Roshan Digital Account and this will be a revolution in remittance of the fund from the overseas Pakistanis. A good percentage of increase and by opening and maintaining the bank account resulting billions of US dollars or in foreign currencies in the overseas bank account in 8 designated banks. And also, will create awareness on the State Bank of Pakistan’s initiative Roshan Digital Account. This move by the Government of Pakistan is very beneficial for all Overseas Pakistanis”, said Dr. S. Qaiser Anis

 

Mr. Imtiaz Feroz Gondal, Charge d’ Affaires, Pakistan Embassy UAE

Mr. Imtiaz Feroz Gondal, Charge d’ Affaires of Pakistan Embassy UAE,  appreciated the initiative of PBPC Abu Dhabi for organizing and arranging the webinar for the benefit of more than a million overseas Pakistanis living in UAE in particular and the GCC countries at large.

That Prime Minister Imran and his government have been focusing to facilitate overseas Pakistanis and resolved their issues. Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi has also focused to provide facilitation to overseas Pakistanis. He is also leading the efforts for increasing our outreach on economic diplomacy and to attract investment from overseas Pakistanis

The State Bank of Pakistan’s arrangements for such an initiative certainly will provide comfort and ease of remittances and operating the accounts in multiple currencies and they can do this digitally which is the need of the hour.

He appreciated that this is the dynamic action taken by the government of Pakistan and this eliminates the hawala business and it is comfort Pakistanis used to have in operating their account because of the various legal requirements of the presence in the country wherever the account holder is operated.

 

Mr. Syed Irfan Ali, Executive Director, State Bank of Pakistan

Mr. Syed Irfan Ali, Executive Director of State Bank of Pakistan said that overseas Pakistanis have opened Roshan Digital Accounts across 61 countries and most of them were from UAE and Saudi Arabi because a large chunk of the country’s diaspora works in these Gulf nations.

He added that the government subsidizes the cost of remittances for overseas Pakistanis, spending around Rd15 Billion (Dhs34 million). To encourage the non-resident Pakistanis to remit more through legal channels, the government has also obtained a fatwa (religious decree) that the Hawala system is not halal.

 

Mr. Arshad M. Bhatti, Director of Exchange Policy Department (EDP), State Bank of Pakistan
presented the Roshan Digital Account

 

The Director of Exchange Policy Department (EDP) of the State Bank of Pakistan, Mr. Arshad M. Bhatti, gave a detailed presentation on the Roshan Digital Accounts to the participants. And that, for the first time in Pakistan’s banking history, Non-resident Pakistan’s have been provided an opportunity to remotely open bank accounts in Pakistan entirely through digital means without visiting a bank in Pakistan or an Embassy or a Consulate office. The facility has been initially launched through 8 Pakistani banks. SBP would continue to add other banks to the list in the future.

Mr. Zulfikar Khokar, Head of Pakistan Remittance Initiative (PRI), State Bank of Pakistan
presented the Initiatives taken by SPB/ Gov’t of Pakistan to promote worker’s remittances

 

Elaborating the efforts of SBP for facilitating overseas Pakistanis, Mr. Zulfikar Khokhar, Head of the Pakistan Remittance Initiative (PRI) presented SBP’s facilitation of home remittances and its benefits to the remittee.

He also announced the future initiatives of SBP that would provide Enhanced International engagement with Pakistan diaspora through Pakistan Embassies and consulates, the use of the latest technology to make remittances, faster, cheaper, accessible, and transparent, and other initiatives that would benefit the non-resident Pakistanis.

The webinar has a question and answers session where many questions were answered by the speakers from the State Bank of Pakistan, then and there, and if there are further questions they encouraged to visiting the website http://www.sbp.org.pk.

In closing, Dr. Qaiser Anis thanks the Charge d’ Affaires and all the speakers for participating in this mission of the council to serve the community and Pakistan.

The webinar was attended by prominent Pakistani community members and representatives of leading community organizations and businesses hailing from Abu Dhabi, Dubai, as well as various parts of the emirates, and from other GCC countries.