| December 6, 2003 | Saturday | Shawwal 11, 1424 |
Please Visit our Sponsor (Ads open in separate window)
Press and administration
IN what appears to be a decidedly welcome move, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has agreed to provide to Pakistan 2.7 billion dollars for as many as 26 projects over the next three years at the rate of nearly a billion dollars annually. Equally welcome is the ADB’s desire to see, in return, this country improve its human development index and reduce the high incidence of poverty. The bank has made it clear that these are not preconditions for qualifying for assistance, but something that is desirable in the very interest of the recipient. Indeed, as the ADB country director for Pakistan, Marshuk Ali Shah, has said, Pakistan’s human development indicators are unfortunately very low compared to other developing countries. According to the latest Pakistan Human Condition report, produced by UNDP, the proportion of people living below the poverty line has increased from 30.1 per cent to 38.1 per cent within a short period. Keeping these stark realities in view, the ADB has decided to focus its assistance on health, education, population and governance. As for social development, the ADB’s emphasis is expected to remain on improving delivery of social services by supporting increased public sector allocations made possible by enhanced fiscal space, improved governance through strengthening of devolution, social administration and financial management.
Over the last four years Pakistan has succeeded in achieving a degree of macroeconomic stability, improved its foreign exchange reserves to an all-time record of $12 billion, higher exports narrowing the trade gap, and enhanced revenue income. However, all these achievements have been rendered virtually meaningless in the face of stagnating investment, rising poverty rate and growing unemployment. The government, it seems, has not been able so far to make proper use of the inch enhanced fiscal space by increasing public sector allocations for social development. This is where the problem lies. The government still appears to be under pressure from the IMF to keep a tight leash on public sector spending in order to further reduce the fiscal deficit, which alone is considered by the IMF capable of leading a developing country out of the mire of poverty.
The IMF formula is simple: Reduce the fiscal deficit to next to nothing, leaving the private sector free to make all investment, even in social sectors. This simplistic formula has never worked anywhere. And the countries that have tried this have dropped further down on the human development scale and experienced acute poverty. Pakistan was saved in the nick of time by the 9/11 economic bonanza, otherwise we would have been in an even worse situation; along with poverty our debt too would have become totally unsustainable and our exports would have continued to stagnate. While the government has succeeded in achieving the fiscal deficit targets set by the IMF, our private sector has kept dragging its feet and refused to take up the investment slack being thrown in its way by the shrinking public sector. Now we have reached a point where one does not even need a fiscal map to see where our private sector is active and where it is not.
It is, time, therefore, to abandon the IMF formula and follow the advice of the ADB by increasing public sector allocations aimed at poverty alleviation and employment generation. The excuse that investment, both local and foreign, is shy because of the country’s image and the bad law and order situation is valid only up to a point because only a handful of countries in the world can boast of an ideal law and order situation. Foreign investment goes to only those countries where the local investor is also active. And local investor becomes active only when he dares take risks. Likewise, a government which never tires of talking about the benefits of letting the economy be governed by market forces but does not hesitate to come to the rescue of rich ‘entrepreneurs’ every time their interests are threatened by market forces will never be able to get out of the clutches of the IMF.
THE federal information minister has been quick to refute allegations levelled by an international human rights group about intimidation and harassment of journalists in Pakistan. The minister has reiterated the government’s position that it would “safeguard and protect freedom of the press as it believes that a free and vibrant media is essential for the consolidation of democracy... and establishing a progressive, moderate and forward-looking society”. The minister’s statement is reassuring, but the New York-based Human Rights Watch was also firm in the charges it made relating to at least two specific cases. One concerns a senior assistant editor of the Herald magazine who apparently attracted President Pervez Musharraf’s ire at a meeting with newspaper editors. The magazine was described as being anti-army. Two days after the president’s remarks, the Herald journalist’s car mysteriously caught fire. The information minister says the police have been asked to investigate the incident, which, according to Human Rights Watch, was followed by a warning to the Herald journalist that this was “just the beginning”. We hope the investigation would be impartial and thorough, and its findings made public. The second incident mentioned by the Human Rights Watch involves a Khuzdar journalist and political activist who was arrested on a charge of “sedition” last year for publishing a photograph of army personnel beating up a crowd of Baloch youth. The journalist is still in jail and is stated to have been tortured. In his refutation of the Human Rights Watch allegations, the information minister has not commented on this particular case.
No doubt since the end of the suffocating Zia era, the print and electronic media have succeeded in carving out space for themselves for uninhibited, at times provocative and personalized, reporting and comment. The Musharraf government largely left the press alone, and an instance of its openness was the debate that raged in newspaper columns over the Kargil adventure. This policy has been followed by the administration led by Prime Minister Jamali, who has come under attack for various sins of omission and commission. The military itself, long considered a sacred cow, has been criticized, notably over the recent Okara farms issue. But old attitudes die hard, and there is a feeling that the army still considers its actions to be above question. If it had confined itself to its constitutional obligations, it would probably have had little to complain about, but since it has intruded into political life, and done so recently in a pervasive manner, it should be prepared for public accountability. Apart from the two specific instances quoted by Human Rights Watch, organizations representing the newspaper industry have been regularly pointing out incidents of intimidation of the press by devious means, including the selective release of official advertising. Police and intelligence officials often act on their own to bring probing journalists in line. Both the Freedom of Information Ordinance and the Press Council Ordinance have also been attacked for failing to take issues of freedom fully into account. It will be in the interest of openness if instances of petty vindictiveness and skullduggery are contained, and a holier-than-thou approach is abandoned.