05-08-2010, 09:53 PM
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[url="http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=237998"]The sick man of South Asia [/url]
Temperatures of over 40 degrees centigrade are a precursor to a long hot summer of discontent. The feel good factor--if there were a scientific method of measuring it--is at an all-time low. There is a pervasive sense of despondency and insecurity about the direction in which the country is heading.
In a hard-hitting speech in the National Assembly the other day, leader of the opposition Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan lambasted the government on the poor law-and-order situation, the endemic load-shedding, and the price hike and unemployment. His boss Mian Nawaz Sharif has threatened that his followers will come out on the streets to protest against the bad state of affairs. President Zardai has made a desperate appeal to the Friends of Pakistan, particularly the US, to help bail out Pakistan's economy.
The plus factors which Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani so proudly highlights as achievements of the PPP government's two-year rule pale before the government's performance. The supremacy and sovereignty of parliament are not in doubt after the consensual passage of the 18th Amendment. Earlier, an agreed NFC Award between the provinces and the Balochistan Package are also feathers in the cap of the government, as well as of the opposition.
Interestingly, the UN report on Ms Benazir Bhutto's assassination has created more confusion than clearly pointing a finger at her real murderers. The three-member committee formed by the prime minister to investigate the hosing down of the site where Ms Bhutto was assassinated has absolved Musharraf's highly controversial MI chief Nadeem Ijaz, irking President Zardari.
The ruling party's so-called core group has again expressed the government's resolve to expose all elements involved in the conspiracy. The ham-handed manner in which the PPP-led government has handled the issue of the tragic assassination of their leader speaks volumes about its lax style of governance based more on cronyism and loyalty to the bosses than on merit. The stark truth is that, despite its professed eagerness to nab the real culprits in Benazir's gruesome murder, the government is stonewalling on the issue.
Bad governance has become the scourge of our democratic dispensation. The malaise is not confined to the federal government. Even the provincial governments, particularly Punjab, are afflicted by it. This is all the more worrisome as, with the Concurrent List gone under the 18th Amendment, the provinces will have to manage their own affairs, and perform rather than look towards the federal government for resources.
Despite a modest recovery from a near-collapse situation in 2008, the dismal state of the economy remains a major source of worry. State Bank governor Salim Raza has put a positive gloss on things by claiming that the economy has stabilised since then. But the plight of the common man and the basic economic indicators leave a lot to be desired. Raza has conceded that inflation has gone up to double digits since last November-- from 9 per cent to 13.5 per cent--and has predicted a GDP growth of no more than 3.5 percent in the current fiscal year.
A former World Bank mandarin [url="http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/the-newspaper/editorial/at-the-edge-of-an-abyss-450"](Shahid Javed Burki ââ¬â Click for his Article)[/url] who also briefly served as Pakistan's caretaker finance minister under Moeen Qureshi has claimed in an article published in a local English daily that [color="#FF0000"]Pakistan is South Asia's "sick man" today[/color]. Quoting form the World Bank Global Monitoring Report, 2010, he contends that all South Asian economies, with the exception of Pakistan and Afghanistan, have pulled themselves out of the partial slowdown caused by the global economic meltdown of 2008-9. This speaks volumes about the governance abilities of our leaders.
Our economic managers can justifiably put the blame for the sluggish growth rate, the high rate of inflation and the power shortages on domestic terrorism taking its toll and on the poor economic planning of the previous regime. However, on the flip side, had it not been for Pakistan's role in the war on terror, where would the country's economy be without the Western largesse?
Islamabad has a fresh team of economic czars in the form of Dr Hafeez Sheikh, the advisor on finance and freshly inducted deputy chairman of the Planning Commission Dr Nadeemul Haq. With their wide international exposure and experience in the World Bank and the IMF they can add value previously lacking. However, will they be able to get the enabling environment to work in a sea of cronyism, lack of transparency and political expediency?
Dr Sheikh's predecessor Shaukat Tarin did a salutary job stabilising the economy. But he could not do more owing to the firewalls built around him by the contending vested interests. As for the former deputy chairman of the Planning Commission, Sardar Assef Ahmed Ali, he was merely keeping the seat warm.
Meanwhile, Punjab chief minister Mian Shahbaz Sharif, being portrayed in planted stories in the print media as an indefatigable administrator, has come up with a proposal for electricity generation by sugar mills instead of running after rental power plants. Mr Sharif, presiding over the Punjab Investment Conference, the first of its kind being held in Sindh under the aegis of his government, claimed that sugar mills could generate 3,000 megawatts of electricity.
Power from bagasse (crushed sugarcane) is not a new idea. Some sugar mills in Punjab, not those owned by the Sharif family, have already taken the route of co-generation of electricity. One of the largest sugar mills of the country has already got an approved tariff rate of 9.23 cents per unit from NEPRA to start producing electricity. However, the managements of some other sugar mills, including those of the Sharifs, insist that the tariff should be 11 cents per unit.
The question arises that if one sugar mill can make money at a lower tariff, why the rest cannot. And why a bonanza at the expense of the common man who will have to pay for the extra cents? Mr Shahbaz Sharif is not in favour of levying import duty on sugar. But how will the sugar mills be viable, producing both sugar and electricity, if imported sugar is cheaper than locally produced sugar, thanks to the high procurement price of sugarcane?
According to this newspaper's report, the Punjab government is on a spree of reemploying "cronies of the Sharif family" on contract basis. These include luminaries like discredited police officer Rana Maqbool, whose sole claim to fame was to torture Mr Asif Ali Zardari when he was in custody. The court-martialled former general Ziauddin Butt and former caretaker chief minister of the province Justice ® Ijaz Nisar, are among many others in the list.
What is most surprising that all this is happening on the watch of a chief minister who prides himself on good governance and transparency and rarely spares the federal government for its failure to live up to these lofty objectives. Naturally, the bureaucracy in Punjab is demoralised when cronies are placed in cushy positions at salaries and perks they can only dream of.
Punjab, from being a surplus province is now in deficit and borrowing heavily from the State Bank to make ends meet. But it is being made to pay Rs25 million for the purchase of a special bullet-proof Mercedes Benz for Governor Salmaan Taseer. Much to the chagrin of the chief minister, a special supplementary grant has been created through relaxation of rules to make the funds available for the purchase.
It is obvious that most of our leaders are quite oblivious of the optics of their actions. In their air-conditioned cocooned environment they hardly seem to be aware of the hard times being faced by the populace at large. With little or no stake being created for the common man in the present system, it is a recipe for disaster for our democratic institutions.
The writer is a former newspaper editor. Email: arifn51@hotmail.com
Cheers![[Image: beer.gif]](http://www.skyscrapercity.com/images/smilies/beer.gif)
[url="http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=237998"]The sick man of South Asia [/url]
Temperatures of over 40 degrees centigrade are a precursor to a long hot summer of discontent. The feel good factor--if there were a scientific method of measuring it--is at an all-time low. There is a pervasive sense of despondency and insecurity about the direction in which the country is heading.
In a hard-hitting speech in the National Assembly the other day, leader of the opposition Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan lambasted the government on the poor law-and-order situation, the endemic load-shedding, and the price hike and unemployment. His boss Mian Nawaz Sharif has threatened that his followers will come out on the streets to protest against the bad state of affairs. President Zardai has made a desperate appeal to the Friends of Pakistan, particularly the US, to help bail out Pakistan's economy.
The plus factors which Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani so proudly highlights as achievements of the PPP government's two-year rule pale before the government's performance. The supremacy and sovereignty of parliament are not in doubt after the consensual passage of the 18th Amendment. Earlier, an agreed NFC Award between the provinces and the Balochistan Package are also feathers in the cap of the government, as well as of the opposition.
Interestingly, the UN report on Ms Benazir Bhutto's assassination has created more confusion than clearly pointing a finger at her real murderers. The three-member committee formed by the prime minister to investigate the hosing down of the site where Ms Bhutto was assassinated has absolved Musharraf's highly controversial MI chief Nadeem Ijaz, irking President Zardari.
The ruling party's so-called core group has again expressed the government's resolve to expose all elements involved in the conspiracy. The ham-handed manner in which the PPP-led government has handled the issue of the tragic assassination of their leader speaks volumes about its lax style of governance based more on cronyism and loyalty to the bosses than on merit. The stark truth is that, despite its professed eagerness to nab the real culprits in Benazir's gruesome murder, the government is stonewalling on the issue.
Bad governance has become the scourge of our democratic dispensation. The malaise is not confined to the federal government. Even the provincial governments, particularly Punjab, are afflicted by it. This is all the more worrisome as, with the Concurrent List gone under the 18th Amendment, the provinces will have to manage their own affairs, and perform rather than look towards the federal government for resources.
Despite a modest recovery from a near-collapse situation in 2008, the dismal state of the economy remains a major source of worry. State Bank governor Salim Raza has put a positive gloss on things by claiming that the economy has stabilised since then. But the plight of the common man and the basic economic indicators leave a lot to be desired. Raza has conceded that inflation has gone up to double digits since last November-- from 9 per cent to 13.5 per cent--and has predicted a GDP growth of no more than 3.5 percent in the current fiscal year.
A former World Bank mandarin [url="http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/the-newspaper/editorial/at-the-edge-of-an-abyss-450"](Shahid Javed Burki ââ¬â Click for his Article)[/url] who also briefly served as Pakistan's caretaker finance minister under Moeen Qureshi has claimed in an article published in a local English daily that [color="#FF0000"]Pakistan is South Asia's "sick man" today[/color]. Quoting form the World Bank Global Monitoring Report, 2010, he contends that all South Asian economies, with the exception of Pakistan and Afghanistan, have pulled themselves out of the partial slowdown caused by the global economic meltdown of 2008-9. This speaks volumes about the governance abilities of our leaders.
Our economic managers can justifiably put the blame for the sluggish growth rate, the high rate of inflation and the power shortages on domestic terrorism taking its toll and on the poor economic planning of the previous regime. However, on the flip side, had it not been for Pakistan's role in the war on terror, where would the country's economy be without the Western largesse?
Islamabad has a fresh team of economic czars in the form of Dr Hafeez Sheikh, the advisor on finance and freshly inducted deputy chairman of the Planning Commission Dr Nadeemul Haq. With their wide international exposure and experience in the World Bank and the IMF they can add value previously lacking. However, will they be able to get the enabling environment to work in a sea of cronyism, lack of transparency and political expediency?
Dr Sheikh's predecessor Shaukat Tarin did a salutary job stabilising the economy. But he could not do more owing to the firewalls built around him by the contending vested interests. As for the former deputy chairman of the Planning Commission, Sardar Assef Ahmed Ali, he was merely keeping the seat warm.
Meanwhile, Punjab chief minister Mian Shahbaz Sharif, being portrayed in planted stories in the print media as an indefatigable administrator, has come up with a proposal for electricity generation by sugar mills instead of running after rental power plants. Mr Sharif, presiding over the Punjab Investment Conference, the first of its kind being held in Sindh under the aegis of his government, claimed that sugar mills could generate 3,000 megawatts of electricity.
Power from bagasse (crushed sugarcane) is not a new idea. Some sugar mills in Punjab, not those owned by the Sharif family, have already taken the route of co-generation of electricity. One of the largest sugar mills of the country has already got an approved tariff rate of 9.23 cents per unit from NEPRA to start producing electricity. However, the managements of some other sugar mills, including those of the Sharifs, insist that the tariff should be 11 cents per unit.
The question arises that if one sugar mill can make money at a lower tariff, why the rest cannot. And why a bonanza at the expense of the common man who will have to pay for the extra cents? Mr Shahbaz Sharif is not in favour of levying import duty on sugar. But how will the sugar mills be viable, producing both sugar and electricity, if imported sugar is cheaper than locally produced sugar, thanks to the high procurement price of sugarcane?
According to this newspaper's report, the Punjab government is on a spree of reemploying "cronies of the Sharif family" on contract basis. These include luminaries like discredited police officer Rana Maqbool, whose sole claim to fame was to torture Mr Asif Ali Zardari when he was in custody. The court-martialled former general Ziauddin Butt and former caretaker chief minister of the province Justice ® Ijaz Nisar, are among many others in the list.
What is most surprising that all this is happening on the watch of a chief minister who prides himself on good governance and transparency and rarely spares the federal government for its failure to live up to these lofty objectives. Naturally, the bureaucracy in Punjab is demoralised when cronies are placed in cushy positions at salaries and perks they can only dream of.
Punjab, from being a surplus province is now in deficit and borrowing heavily from the State Bank to make ends meet. But it is being made to pay Rs25 million for the purchase of a special bullet-proof Mercedes Benz for Governor Salmaan Taseer. Much to the chagrin of the chief minister, a special supplementary grant has been created through relaxation of rules to make the funds available for the purchase.
It is obvious that most of our leaders are quite oblivious of the optics of their actions. In their air-conditioned cocooned environment they hardly seem to be aware of the hard times being faced by the populace at large. With little or no stake being created for the common man in the present system, it is a recipe for disaster for our democratic institutions.
The writer is a former newspaper editor. Email: arifn51@hotmail.com
Cheers
![[Image: o.gif]](http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/shared/img/o.gif)
But the past two years had seen "the killing or capturing of a great number of the leadership of significant terrorist groups", Mrs Clinton added. 
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