Global platforms have long tapped into Pakistan’s vast user base—extracting attention, data, and advertising revenue—while leaving limited economic residue behind. Their presence feels inevitable, yet their participation remains minimal. Ahsan Tahir (CEO of Walee) mentions that “Pakistani creators and advertisers fuel these systems, but the value rarely returns in the form of local jobs, taxation, or technology infrastructure. This is no longer a rhetorical concern; it is a strategic national priority: how does a country shift from being a marketplace to being a stakeholder or participant in global platforms such as Google, Meta and Tiktok?”
Countries such as Malaysia and Indonesia have proven that policy can convert digital dominance into national development. Malaysia’s digital services tax and Indonesia’s mandatory local registration for foreign platforms offer viable pathways
Pakistan must push for and assert its digital sovereignty. It has the right to create policies and frameworks for how platforms operate within their boundaries. To provide incentives for foreign tech firms to invest, employ, and reinvest locally. Such demands are a practical strategy and are already prevalent in several other sectors of the economy such as FMCGs and Telecoms. Nations like Malaysia, which has imposed a digital service tax structure, and Indonesia, which requires foreign operators to register locally, offer blueprints for converting transient presence into lasting economic benefit.
As Muhammad Ahsan Tahir, CEO of Walee, argues, “Platforms must invest in the countries they profit from.” His stance is not oppositional but reformist. Pakistan, he contends, must build frameworks that invite cooperation while insisting on shared responsibility—ensuring platforms co-create capacity rather than extract value.
This shift has urgency. In 2025, Pakistan’s Finance Act proposed a Digital Presence Proceeds Tax (DPPT) that would collect 5 percent of gross proceeds from foreign digital services operating in the country. The tax was suspended almost immediately after pressure from international interests. That whiplash illustrates the fragility of policy when the state is not positioned as an equal in the digital bargain. Pakistan’s digital sovereignty effort must be built on stable rules from taxation to mandates of local presence that platforms cannot unsettle with external pressure.
Tax Justice as Digital Strategy
Imposing a tax on tech giants that operate without a physical base is not new in international debate. The OECD’s Inclusive Framework seeks to correct the misalignment of where value is created versus where tax is paid. Yet universal adoption has stalled. For Pakistan, the actual challenge lies in designing a tax regime that collects revenue without scaring off investment. The 2025 Finance Bill tried to walk that line, setting low withholding rates for export-oriented digital services but steep rates (8–15 percent) for unregulated digital services. It also proposed the DPPT, which was later deferred.
These debates matter. Pakistan’s IT exports grew by 29 percent (CAGR) over 17 months and earned US$3.8 billion in the first nine months of 2025. That potential must feed the tax base, not leak abroad in royalty payments or profit shifting. The digital invoicing requirement recently extended by the Federal Board of Revenue is another piece of the puzzle: linking online transactions to enforceable tax routines. Still, when multinationals wield trade clauses or diplomatic leverage, weak rules melt under pressure. Pakistan must design tax laws that embed local presence, mandatory registration, and enforceable audits.
In the middle of this contention, voices like Ahsan Tahir’s carry weight because they unify the entrepreneur and the national interest. Walee began as a marketplace for influencer marketing serving over 150,000 creators and 5,000 clients. As the platform matured, Tahir expanded into fintech, media rights, and consulting. Through Walee, he sees firsthand how local digital ecosystems can grow but only if structural constraints allow it. “Technology is only as good as the trust it carries,” he has said. If platforms refuse local accountability, trust fractures.
Building Digital Ecosystems with Skin in the Game
The essence of platform accountability is about tax as well as local stakeholding. Pakistan must require that global digital firms establish legal entities, hire local staff, invest in infrastructure, and partner in talent development. When platforms contribute to the ecosystem: funding AI labs, content grants, and data science training, they become less extractive and more generative. Walee’s own journey shows how that can be done: the company formalized payments to creators, set up a Center of Excellence in collaboration with NUST, and established ventures like Hakeem (an Islamic nano-finance offering) under its umbrella.
Mandating local reinvestment is politically delicate. It cannot feel like extortion, or it will stifle innovation. The balance lies in embedding co-investment in regulation. For example, the government might require a share of revenue be devoted to a digital talent fund, matched by the platform itself. Malaysian and Indonesian frameworks may serve as reference points. Over time, those investments nurture a pipeline of local technologists, data scientists, storytellers, and systems engineers. The result is a self-reinforcing cycle: the more local talent, the less dependency on foreign firms and the stronger local alternatives become.
Pakistan’s challenge is configuring this cycle without scaring off partners. Platforms must feel that contributing is cheaper than withholding from the ecosystem. Walee’s model of combining media, fintech, and public sector consulting shows how a digital firm can wear multiple hats and remain locally rooted. Tahir positions himself as a partner in setting standards. His voice matters because he builds rather than dismantles.
A New Bargain for Digital Sovereignty
The path ahead is not easy. Powerful platforms will push back, arguing cost, border friction, and global tax treaties. Pakistan’s institutions: tax regulators, courts, digital authorities must be built to outlast those pressures. The new Pakistan Digital Authority, created under the Digital Nation Pakistan Act, 2025, offers one institutional anchor to manage digital policy, infrastructure, and oversight. But authority means little without teeth. Rules must be clear: foreign platforms must register, pay for impact, and embed local value in their operations.
When a state demands more than consumption from taxes, investment, local presence, it signals confidence. Pakistan will no longer be a passive consumer of global platform power; it claims standing in how these platforms are built, run, and governed. The fight for digital sovereignty and accountability is about reclaiming economic agency.
The crescendo must come not through confrontation, but by forging a new digital compact. Under that compact, platforms thrive and Pakistan thrives with them. As Ahsan Tahir’s perspective underscores, this is not confrontation; it is collaboration on equal terms. Innovation should build capacity, not dependency. That is the cornerstone of the new digital bargain Pakistan must seek.
