Nawaz Sharif, the prime minister of Pakistan, likes to invoke the spirit of Thatcherism, so privatisation would have a natural place in his government's reform plans, even if the International Monetary Fund (IMF) was not insisting on it. But political and trade union opposition have forced it to slow down its once ambitious programme of asset sales.
Mr Sharif pursued privatisation in his previous incarnations as prime minister, when he was accused by opposition parties of cronyism and selling state assets on the cheap. This time around the process is more transparent, and the government originally identified 68 companies whose sales could raise $5bn over two years.
