ISLAMABAD — Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz said on Thursday that there was “significant evidence” of “sufficient quantities” of placer gold flowing in the province’s five rivers. She was speaking at the Pakistan Minerals Investment Forum in Islamabad, an initiative aimed at harnessing the country’s mineral resources and attracting domestic and foreign investment in the mining sector.
The chief ministers of Balochistan and Sindh, as well as KP Governor Faisal Karim Kundi, also attended the forum. Maryam said Punjab was the land of five rivers and that gold was “literally flowing” in all five, particularly in the areas of Mianwali and Attock. She described Pakistan as a “pot of gold”, saying its wealth lay both above and beneath the ground and needed to be explored and turned into tangible wealth.
“The wealth beneath Punjab was never a problem, never a problem, just like the whole of Pakistan, just like all four provinces and the federating units. The chaos above ground was the actual problem,” she said. Maryam said revenue generated by the provincial Mines and Minerals Department had increased from Rs10 billion to Rs40bn in two and a half years.