KARACHI: The Pakistan Cricket Board announced on Thursday it had decided to postpone the ongoing Pakistan Super League cricket series after a number of players tested positive for the coronavirus.
Three players tested positive for COVID-19 on Thursday. Islamabad’s two foreign cricketers, including Australian leg-spinner Fawad Ahmed, and another unnamed foreign player, are already in isolation after testing positive earlier this week.
“Following a meeting with the team owners and considering the health and wellbeing of all participants is paramount, the Pakistan Cricket Board has decided to postpone the HBL Pakistan Super League 6 with immediate effect,” the PCB said in a statement. “The decision was made after seven cases were reported in the competition, which had started on 20 February.”
“The PCB, as an immediate step, will focus on the safe and secure passage of all participants, and arrange repeat PCR tests, vaccines and isolation facilities to the six participating sides,” the statement said.
PCB has also decided to offer coronavirus vaccine doses to all participants of PSL, becoming the first cricket board to do so.
“The decision has been made in the line with the PCB’s duty of care policy and to ensure all participants of the league remain safe and healthy during the event, which concludes on 22 March,” PCB said in a separate statement on Wednesday. “The vaccine doses will be administered on Thursday and will be offered to all those inside the biosecure bubble. However, it will solely be the players and officials’ decision if they want to get the vaccine shots.”
PCB Chief Executive Wasim Khan said the cricket board took the “health, safety and wellbeing of its players and officials very seriously.”

DHAKA/KARACHI: The National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) is closing one of its Bangladesh branches after failing to recover nearly 98 percent of its loans from Bangladeshi debtors, the bank’s country head has said.
The Pakistan government-owned NBP has branches in 21 countries and assets worth $20 billion. It has been operating in Bangladesh as NBP-BD since 1994, with four branches in three cities, serving about 8,000 customers.
The bank ran into trouble in 2013-24, after numerous debtors — mainly from the apparel sector — failed to meet loan obligations, Bangladesh central bank data shows. In December last year, NBP-BD’s defaults amounted to $164 million, or 97.7 percent of its total loans.
“We are going to close the operations at our Sylhet branch due to an extraordinary situation,” Mohammad Quamruzzaman, NBP-BD chief executive, told Arab News earlier this week. “The headquarters in Pakistan has given us the approval, and the shutdown process is underway.”
In the past six years, the bank has filed 143 cases against loan defaulters, recovering about $23 million, Quamruzzaman said, adding that the bank was now trying to recover more without litigation and had suspended loan disbursement last year.
“Our high priority now is to recover the non-performing loans. We are focusing on an alternative dispute resolution (ADR) process where we sit at the negotiation table with the clients,” he said. “The good news is that we are receiving some positive results in the ADR process where the banks offer concessions to the defaulters and they, in turn, get the opportunity to have a clear banking credit record.”
Without clearing their records, Quamruzzaman added, businesses “can’t avail loans from any other banks in the future.”
Manzoorul Alam, managing director of Ibrahim Composite Textile mill (ICTM), which borrowed $8.5 million from NBP-BD in fiscal year 2012-13, said negotiations with the bank were underway.
“During negotiation we offered the bank to repay around $16.5 million. We sent this proposal in December 2019 and there was no work last year due to coronavirus pandemic,” Alam told Arab News. “I had a discussion with the bank around three weeks back and they assured to resolve the matter shortly according to our negotiations.”
Pakistani officials at the NBP’s head office in Karachi were unavailable for comment despite repeated requests. Bangladesh Bank, the central bank, declined comment.
Zahid Hussain, former lead economist of the World Bank in Dhaka, said the Bangladeshi central bank should create a safety net for lenders by enhancing its supervision, and “save the NBP-BD from the deep crisis.”
“There are few options which the central bank may consider, like injection of new funds, merger with a solvent bank, the appointment of an administrator etc. In the current scenario, NBP should run its operations under the close supervision of the central bank,” he told Arab News.
Another Bangladeshi economist, Policy Research Institute executive director Ahsan H. Mansoor, said the NBP’s situation was extraordinary as defaulted loans are about 10 percent of all loans at banks in Bangladesh.
“This is an extraordinary situation that NBP-BD is struggling with around 98 percent defaulted loans,” he said. “There should be an investigation [into] who were these borrowers and how it took place.”
As per the NBP-BD’s Annual Report 2019, its branches recorded a net loss of BDT 664 million in 2019, up 60 percent Year-Over-Year (YoY) as compared to BDT 415 million of 2018.
“The main reasons for this loss were a 20 percent YoY jump in interest expense to BDT 1.6 billion and a whopping increase in total provisioning to BDT 137 million (CY19: nil),” Sana Tawfik, Banking sector analyst at Karachi-based Arif Habib Limited, told Arab News.
The branches incurred an OPEX of BDT 197 million compared to BDT 174 million recorded in the same period last year, marking an increase of 13 percent YoY, which “increased pressure on the bottom-line.” 
“As of Dec. 2019, the cumulative ADR and IDR of the branches stood at 74 percent and 79 percent, respectively,” Tawfik said. “Going forward, a turnaround in the overall earnings is dependent upon successful recovery of loans and advances, increasing business volumes, the success of commercial and strategic initiatives and financial and liquidity support from concerned stakeholders, as per the Annual Report (2019).”