Public parasites The country cannot progress and survive unless the government dismantles elitist structures that feed on public money By Huzaima Bukhari & Dr. Ikramul Haq Judges of higher judiciary, military and civil hierarchy and parliamentarians feel that they are underpaid, thus, economically deprived! Frequently, the parliamentarians pass laws for their own benefits extending more emoluments and fringe benefits! President keeps on enhancing benefits of judges. No doubt, economic deprivation prevails for the majority of low-paid employees, but the top-notches give them only peanuts — in retaliation they resort to corrupt practices in the name of “necessity”. This is in a nutshell our nizam-e-hakumat (system of governance). It is a strange form of polity where the privilege classes want more and more share in taxpayers’ money in the form of free plots and perquisites. The total amount spent on military establishment — not for defence needs but for the luxuries of the generals and other high-ranking officers — is not less than Rs125 billion. The cost of running the offices of president, governors, prime minister, ministers, advisers (supported by huge staff) in a year is between Rs130-145 billion — 60 per cent of it is extending a host of fringe benefits. The entertainment budget alone of the Prime Minister’s House and the President’s House is Rs170 million and Rs195 million respectively. One minister costs around Rs60 million per year; whereas we spend Rs144 per Pakistani per year for health; and Rs145 per Pakistani per year for education! Former prime minister, Yousaf Raza Gillani, while speaking to a grand gathering of senior bureaucrats in Lahore, asked the Pay and Pension Commission, notified on April 2009, to come up with concrete suggestions for “a reasonable pay and pension package for the government employees”. The so-called party of the people, established by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, in its 5-year rule did not bother to establish any commission to assess the unbearable incidence of taxes and cost of basic services to the ordinary citizens and how to give them relief. But Zardari et al were very concerned to give pay raises and benefits to the judges of Supreme Court and High Courts, military and civil bureaucrats. These institutions have failed to deliver but enjoy unfettered powers. The high-ranking officials have dual nationalities and enormous hidden assets — kept mostly outside but also within the country in the names of others (benami). No doubt all the public servants have legitimate right to get reasonable pay and security of job — the State must fulfill its duty of good pay master. But in turn, they should be the public servants in real sense of the word and not the Gora sahibs. We beg money from all and sundry and then provide luxuries to elites. It is shameful and deplorable. No growth has been achieved even after borrowing billion of dollars. People are dying of hunger — majority is living in miserable conditions — and our privileged public servants (sic), public office holders, generals and judges are not ready to give away their perks and benefits. In a democratic setup they should get ‘Consolidated Pay Package’ and pay tax on it like others do. Way back in 1964, a book titled ‘Your most Disobedient Servant’ was published by a civil servant in a transport service of the UK. It revealed the losses and irregularities in the use or misuse of official transports — it eventually paved the way for ‘Consolidated Pay Package’ that monetized pay, perks, privileges of those serving in state organisations. It reduced the corruption a great deal. Civil society and social media in Pakistan must take up this issue forcefully. According to a press report, “in the locality sprawling over an area of 1,514 kanals of Mozang, Lahore, the largest house in the area, over 52 kanals, is the designated house for the Lahore High Court Chief Justice. The Commissioner’s House is the second largest house covering 26 kanals. The Chief Secretary’s House covers 12 kanals and the Chief Minister’s House covers 5 kanals. These are painful facts. The beneficiaries of these huge residences, constructed from taxpayers’ money or borrowed funds, claim to be public servants or the custodian of law. They give public sermons about rule of law and great democratic movement launched by the ordinary citizens that restored them, but feel no compulsion for living like them. Repeatedly they quote from Islamic “golden age” of administration. But seldom have they mentioned that in pre-monarchical Islamic period, the rulers used to take minimum possible amounts — only for their essential needs — from Baitul Maal (national exchequer). Millions are spent every year for the renovation, alteration and landscaping of Lahore’s GORs to facilitate the civil, police and judiciary high-ups living there. The renovation of Punjab House in Islamabad, Karachi, Murree and Rawalpindi has been part of five successive budgets of Khadim-i-Aala’s. This is the story of good governance in the Punjab where the Chief Minister prefers to be called Khadim-i-Aala (Chief Servant)! The situation in other provinces and the federal government is no different — rather it is worse. Huge sums are spent (rather wasted) for providing privileges to the high-ranking government officials and politicians. The same situation prevails in the military establishment. The style of living of our generals is unmatched in the world. In the post-colonial period they became not only political masters but also the main beneficiaries of country’s major resources. While the government servants blame politicians for plundering and wasting the money, they allege that bureaucracy is the root cause of all the ills. They claim that a secretary of government costs at least Rs500,000 per month to national exchequer with lot of facilities and perquisites in kind. If rent-free accommodation given to him in Islamabad alone is evaluated on market basis, the benefit is not less worth Rs250,000 per month. In addition, he exercises unfettered powers and defy the orders of elected members of parliament and even sometime of ministers. These facts call for immediate right-sizing — closing down of all the unnecessary departments, divisions, sub-divisions and allied paraphernalia [see list in ‘Capital Suggestions’, The News, January 04, 2009]. The list is long and astonishing. At Constitution Avenue, Islamabad, one can count 30 useless government establishments that are doing nothing but have imposing buildings and huge staff. The same is true everywhere — in all parts of the country one finds government offices, overstaffed, wasting money and time and making the lives of the citizens difficult. Living in sprawling bungalows with army of servants, the rulers, mighty bureaucrats, judges and generals are least pushed to bother how the common man is living (or dying) — even totally indifferent towards their own fellow low-paid employees. The civil-military structure in Pakistan is class-oriented and against the basic precepts of democracy. They make policies while sitting in the air-conditioned rooms for poverty alleviation and what not. Since independence, State of Pakistan is either directly run or controlled by a strong civil-military complex. It has proved to be crueler than colonial masters — in terms of oppression, denying the people their fundamental rights and being highly inefficient and corrupt. Political elite, playing in the hands of civil-military complex, has also shown strong indignation towards pro-people decentralised governance. Our governance model — under civil or military rules alike — has proved to be even worse than many developing countries where decentralisation has brought benefits for the people at gross root level. Our rulers have failed to empower the masses by implementing the command of Constitution — Article 140A says: “Each Province shall, by law, establish a local government system and devolve political, administrative and financial responsibility and authority to the elected representatives of the local governments.” The immediate actions should include right-sizing of huge government machinery and monetising of all the fringe benefits and perquisites in kind given to the employees [see detailed recommendations by Dr Ishrat Hussain, Shahid Kardar, Nadeem ul Haque and many others]. Democratisation and decentralisation necessarily requires complete reform of our civil service and military establishment as well as accountability of public office holders. The State must withdraw from all its employees and public office holders all facilities like houses, cars, servants, telephones etc. All perquisites given in kind should be monetised. Let the government servants — especially the senior bureaucrats — live with the ordinary citizens of Pakistan and not in GORs or other posh (isolated) colonies. It will give them real insight how the policies should be made and what are the real problems of the ordinary folk. The government must give ‘Consolidated Pay Package’ to its employees — there should be no free plots, free club memberships, fringe benefits and perquisites in kind. This will be the starting point of change in society — beginning of the democratisation of governance. It is the Constitutional duty of the State to treat all the citizens equally and provide them the facilities of education, health and transportation. Since all the money is spent on the luxuries of the elites, the State has persistently failed to fulfill its main responsibility. If we want to survive and progress, we will have to dismantle elitist structures. ________________________________________ The writers, tax lawyers, are members of visiting faculty of Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS)
Posted on: Sun, 21 Jul 2013 04:38:36 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015