Can donors endorse good governance in Pakistan?

Can donors endorse good governance in Pakistan?

‘Governance’ has always been a matter of concern for the dwellers of Pakistan. Governments, both democratic and dictatorial, despite declaring and recognizing it as an important point in their manifestos, have rarely gone beyond
rhetoric. They tend to overlook the existence of mal-governance while in power, and only be considerate to the issue when are confined to the opposition benches or sent to forced exiles.

Perhaps that is the reason that instead of looking towards the governments and politicians to maintain order and good governance in the country, the civil society has now tied its hopes with the public taking the lead through realizing,
assuming and practicing its real power. The experience from developing countries has now clearly established the fact that with greater involvement of the masses, governance automatically tends to improve and the ways for corruption and mal-administration
tend to squeeze and eventually disappear.

While this new idea for putting the country in order holds some water, it is also a fact that marred by lack of education, rife hunger, acute poverty, natural disasters coupled with government’s insensitivity towards plight of
people and ever worsening law and order situation, people are more likely to lose their faith in themselves and their power to oust the corrupt and put the honest ones – if only they exist in Pakistani politics, in the saddle. This calls for the need of some
outer help. Help, from someone who has a say in the matters of the country and who, at least, is listened to carefully and not turned a deaf ear without given a second thought – and who are the – International donors.

Well, does this thought lack logic? Perhaps not. How? Let me explain it. Back in early 2000, when Pakistan was expecting a loan tranche from an international financial institution, minutes before signing the deal, the IFI officials
realized that under the agreement Pakistan could only acquire the loan had it had a right to information law in the country. But since the country had never admitted the citizen’s right to have an access to the government held information, it stood ineligible
for the loan.

Baffled by the situation, the then officials of cash starved ministry of finance approached the then president Pervez Musharraf, who consented to pass a presidential ordinance accepting common people’s right to information. Now,
as the country had a law, although on the papers only, it saved the loan.

However, since there was no pressure from the donors for the implementation of the law, even after a decade since the ordinance was passed, it still hangs in the balance and awaits for proper legislation. Since then, hundreds of
applications were forwarded to the government departments seeking information pertinent to the people’s welfare, but, amid lack of proper advocacy and dissemination of information on this important change in the constitution of the country, just like majority
of the commoners, the government officials were also oblivious of the presence of any such law in the country, and thus they rarely entertained the applications that tried to invoke this law to acquire government held information.

Nevertheless, amid a wiser decision on part of a donor, the country at least had a law which could accrue strength with the passage of time. This is because of the incidents like these that the civil society now believes that if
financial aid or loan is linked to good governance, the sanity may prevail among those having helms of affairs in their hands and they may allow the development and functioning of institutions for a better governance structure.

However, leaving the matters onto donors only may not do any significant better either and besides having support from the IFIs, common people of Pakistan will also have to come forward and hold the public office holders accountable
of what wrongs they have been contributing towards the decay of the country.

In this regards, it is important to refer to Pakistan’s eastern nieghbour – India. In India, instead of donor driven, all the legislation pertinent to right to information and government accountability was initiated and led by
the people. While in past ten years there were only few hundred applications seeking an access to government held documents in Pakistan, in India, the number, by no means, was less than millions. And perhaps that is the reason that while here in Pakistan democracy
is being associated to a selected few sticking to the corridors of power, its essence is being visible and taking deep roots in its next door neighbour.

Thus, besides seeking help from the donors, the civil society will also have to invest its energies in educating the masses to play their role for the betterment of the country as leaving it onto the politicians or dictators who
are used to running it on ad hoc basis may not work now.

The writer is a researcher at Sustainable Development Policy Institute and may be reached at
fayyaz@sdpi.org

Short URL: https://www.newspakistan.pk/?p=18129

Posted by Fayyaz Yaseen on Apr 5 2012. Filed under Opinion, Pakistan. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry