PREOCCUPIED as the state is with the challenge of militancy and extremism, there is little focus on other grave issues that demand the government’s immediate attention. The administration needs to be reminded of these — and of the fact that millions of people live in want and very little is being done for them. Nowhere is this failing of the state machinery more evident than in Pakistan’s progress on the Millennium Development Goals, a global initiative to address baseline issues such as child and maternal mortality, access to education, sanitation, etc. Next week, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is expected to address the 68th session of the UN General Assembly, where representatives of many countries will report their progress on the MDGs. Can we lay claim to a positive report card? Going by the figures in the Planning Commission’s progress report, it would appear not.

Leave aside the fact that the draft has not yet been finalised even though the UN moot is a few days away, let us focus on the dismal progress the country has made in its efforts to meet the 2015 MDG targets. The education target, for example, is universal primary education. Pakistan had a net primary enrolment ratio of 46 in 1990-91; today, it is 57. The mortality rate of children under five was 117 in 1990-91; it is 89 today, while the MDG target is 52. The same grim picture appears no matter which MDG is considered: Pakistan is so far from its targets that practically all of them seem unreachable. What’s worse, in many areas it is impossible to even form an accurate picture because the data is so old. The most recent figures available for maternal mortality and the proportion of people living in extreme poverty and hunger, for example, are from the 2005-06 period.

The ruling PML-N government would doubtless say that it is merely a few months into its tenure. Certainly, one of the main points of criticism levelled at the previous government was its lack of performance in terms of developmental work. Yet even the PML-N’s reference to the MDGs in its election manifesto was only passing, and it can hardly claim to have made the goals a priority since it took up the reins of government. Many would say that this is indicative of the priority accorded by those in powerful places to the people whose interests they are meant to serve. Unless this mindset changes, it will be impossible to achieve the development goals even much after the deadline has passed.