Govt to form parliamentary committee for electoral reforms

ISLAMABAD: The government has decided to constitute a high-level parliamentary committee to prepare a comprehensive electoral reforms package to ensure rigging-free elections in the country.

An official source told The News here on Thursday that the parliamentary committee would include representatives of all the political parties in proportion to their representation in parliament. It would be an influential committee like the one assigned the task of recommending the 18th Amendment by the previous parliament.

Although, most of the political parties had complaints about rigging in the last year elections, it was the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf that has agitated the issue most and recently even started street protests and public rallies to get the electoral process reformed.

PTI Chairman Imran Khan not only seeks the reformation of the electoral process but has also demanded of the removal of all members of the present Election Commission of Pakistan. The PTI wants the constitution of a new commission.

Different political parties, including the PPP, have endorsed the PTI’s demand but they want to address the issue within parliament instead of taking it to the streets. The PTI strategy, however, seems to have worked as the government is now going to set up the parliamentary committee for electoral reforms.

It is expected that like Senator Raza Rabbani-led parliamentary committee for the 18th Amendment, the electoral reforms committee would also prepare a comprehensive electoral reforms package with consensus.

Although, generally the blame is placed on the ECP for electoral rigging in the last elections, the outgoing parliament has had its major share in this situation as it had blocked critically- important ECP legislation, which had sought empowerment of the Election Commission of Pakistan on the lines of the Indian model.

The legislative bill was referred to parliament in February 2013 for enactment but it did not give it a serious thought.During the last one year, none of the political parties in the present parliament has bothered to take it up for consideration either in the National Assembly or in the Senate.

The bill, which was approved by the ECP under the then Chief Election Commissioner Fakhruddin G Ebrahim, had mainly sought the empowerment of the ECP to transfer or suspend any officer, including the chief secretary or the inspector general of police, in case such an officer was found involved in meddling in election affairs or creating hurdles in holding of elections in a free, fair and independent manner.

The bill had also proposed 30-day scrutiny period but even this was not allowed by the previous parliament. The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) had approved a 30-day scrutiny period for nomination papers of candidates to ensure that frauds, fake degree holders, tax and utility bill defaulters and other cheats are barred from contesting the next polls by cross checking their credentials from the concerned authorities.

To ensure true representation of the people, the legislative bill had also recommended that the winners in elections must bag 50 percent of the total votes cast. The fines for violation of the code of conduct were also proposed to be increased manifold. For instance, Rs100,000 fine was recommended to be imposed on a voter casting a bogus vote. Those committing election forgery were also recommended to pay a fine of Rs100,000 and face up to five-year imprisonment.The present system is also short of any mechanism for the implementation of articles 62 and 63 to ensure that only the persons of character could get into parliament.

Osama commission’s call for intelligence reforms ignored

 

ISLAMABAD: The debate on bringing the intelligence agencies under legal oversight has not popped up suddenly after the attack on Hamid Mir, as even the Abbottabad Commission represented by an army general had also made strong calls for intelligence reforms.
However, like all other reports, the government and intelligence agencies did not pay any heed to the recommendations of the commission and, as a result, the gulf between the ordinary people and intelligence agencies is widening.

The Abbottabad Commission, constituted by the Supreme Court after the killing of Osama bin Laden in a covert CIA operation, had called for comprehensive reforms to improve the working of intelligence community, both in terms of effectiveness and respecting human rights and the rule of law.

Former Supreme Court judge Justice Javaid Iqbal headed the commission while its members included Lieutenant-General (retired) Nadeem Ahmad, former Pakistani envoy Ashraf Kazi, civil servant Nargis Sethi and former Inspector-General of KP Police Abbas Khan.

While criticising the intelligence agencies for failing to detect OBL in the country for nine years, the commission said: “There is an urgent need for the scrutiny of the power and mandate of security agencies, the laws under which they are supposed to work, the nature of oversight and accountability mechanism.”

The commission also stressed that intelligence agencies must not overstep their mandate. “Unless this happens, relations between the intelligence community and the people will remain adversarial and counter-productive. Instead of Pakistan making the transition from a dysfunctional security state to a functioning development state it will run the risk of becoming further degraded to an intelligence and police state.”

The report pointed out that in the absence of proper accountability procedures, the intelligence agencies, including ISI, have lost competence. “The problem was apparent: none among the intelligence community, including the premier intelligence organisation, which is ISI, has ever been subjected to proper accountability procedures. It is a law of nature that under such circumstances, institutions degenerate and progressively lose competence. This has happened in Pakistan.”

Urging the political leadership to reform intelligence agencies through proper accountability, the commission endorsed the views of a Pakistan human rights activist who said: “Unless there is political initiative in this regard no technical, administrative procedure or other reforms of the military/intelligence system can happen.

“There are a number of reports that have been written, including Air Marshal (Retd) Zulfikar Ali Khan’s report and recommendations to redesign our intelligence system and make it more effective. The commission therefore recommends that these reports be studied,” the report said.

The attack on Hamid Mir and the allegations on the ISI by his family have once again brought the issue of intelligence reforms under public spotlight but the chances of any outcome in this regard are still very slim.

According to a report on international legislation on intelligence oversight, Pakistan is one of the few democracies in the world with no mechanism of parliamentary oversight of intelligence agencies.

The report titled “Making Intelligence Accountable: Legal Standards and Best Practices for Oversight of Intelligence Agencies,” states that even countries which were previously governed by military rule under authoritarian regimes have carried out intelligence reforms, a study of legislation indicates.

Budgetary reforms and way forward

 

Government’s budget is a reflection of its policy intent. Through the budget, the government pronounces how it intends to foster job creation, stabilise the economy, bring down prices and facilitate investments. Now that the preparation of Federal Budget 2014-15 is progressing, I want to take this opportunity to explain our budget-making mechanism, broad-level medium-term priorities, and what will be the newer ways of working to enhance public sector efficiency going-forward.
The Federal Government is in the process of innovating new methods and processes to improve the system of public budgeting. Since government budget plays a key role in economic stability and growth and affects citizens and businesses, it is important that efforts should be focused on establishing a modern system of budgeting.

The Ministry of Finance has embarked upon important reforms that are aimed at improving fiscal discipline, focusing budget allocations towards emerging government priorities (for example, energy, public security, unemployment etc.), and introducing a system that focuses on achievement of results.

Living within the available means or controlling government’s budget deficit is an important economic consideration. If government expenses are more than its revenues, then it borrows money from banking system to finance these expenses. Borrowing beyond a certain limit can discourage private businesses from investments, which is an activity that creates jobs in the economy. Too much borrowing can also result in increased money supply that leads to rise in prices of commodities–called inflation. This in turn leads to increase in interest rates, which is also a discouraging factor for the businesses to grow. As public debts increase they impose a high cost. In 2012-13, the Federal Government paid 63% of net revenues (revenues available after transfer to provinces) as interest. High budget deficits also have an impact on sustainability of foreign reserves. Hence, a well thought out and sustainable budget policy is fundamental to a good budgeting system.

Many countries in the world have reformed their budgeting systems to meet the growing challenges of sustainability of debts, improved efficiency in allocations due to growing needs for austerity, and focus on performance for improving lives of the citizens and facilitating businesses. These reforms are necessary to avoid bankruptcy situation that for example recently arose in Greece.

Two important steps are required for making the budget sustainable. First is the adoption of fiscal rules –providing a legal backing of an upper limit of public debts. Second is the adoption of a Medium Term Budgetary Framework. The current government plans to halve the fiscal deficit, which reached 8 of GDP in 2012-13 (had it been unchecked, it would have been 8.8% of GDP) to 4% by June 2017. To achieve this important target the Ministry of Finance is strengthening the Medium-Term Budgetary Framework. This system requires preparation of a medium-term (3-5 years) macroeconomic framework (forecasts of GDP growth, investment, reserves, etc.), and a fiscal framework (i.e. forecasts of revenues, expenditures and borrowings). These forecasts and sectoral policies (e.g. investments in energy sector) are presented to the Cabinet in shape of a 3-years ‘Budget Strategy Paper’. Each year the Budget Strategy Paper is tabled in the cabinet that debates allocations, policy priorities, future investment needs, fiscal space, and issues such as economic stability.

The Budget Strategy Paper is guided by our medium-term macroeconomic goals. By June 2017, the government intends to achieve around 7% of annual GDP growth, reduce budget deficit to 4% of GDP, increase revenues to close to 15% of GDP and investments to 20% of GDP, and keep inflation in single-digits. When the government took over in June 2013, the GDP growth was 3.6%, budget deficit was about to reach 8.8% of GDP, revenues were 13% of GDP, and investments fell to historic low of 14% of GDP.

Determination of goals allows us to closely monitor our performance and make adjustments where required. I am happy to state that we are gradually progressing on our macroeconomic stabilisation plan and July-February performance suggests that tax revenues have increased by around 18% as compared to last year, and we have been successful in containing budget deficit to 3.1% of GDP as compared to 4.1% last year. Inflationary pressures that increased in the first quarter of 2013-14 have reduced in the second quarter and we are hopeful that the inflation will remain between 8% and 9% for the year. While it is relatively early to state that economic growth has entered into the next gear, there are positive signs emerging on different fronts.

The Budget Strategy Paper forms the foundation of the government’s budget. The medium-term perspective allows the government to set targets. Questions such as how the government will achieve this target, what policies will be adopted and what are the risks, are analysed to ensure that the targets remain achievable. The Budget Strategy Paper is also shared with the Parliamentary Standing Committees, political parties, and businesses to allow debate on the policies and forecasts. This makes the system more participatory, and transparent. Recommendation of citizens on government’s taxation and expenditure policies are currently collected at the budgetary stage but going-forward, we want to create a process through which there is a mechanism that ensures a formal participation.

Based on the forecasts detailed in the Budget Strategy Paper, each ministry is given 3-years expenditure ceilings. These are the total amounts within which ministries prepare their detailed budgets. To this date, we have forwarded 2014-17 budget ceilings, in two-envelops – one for current budgets and the other for public investments required for improving quality and access of public services, to all ministries. The ministries are being encouraged to cut down on wasteful expenditure and divert funds to high priority areas. Better public services, improved infrastructure, strengthened regulatory environment, availability of energy for businesses to enhance production, and human development are the selected priorities of the present government. We intend to ring-fence social protection expenditure so that the needy and the poor do not feel burdened by our drive for austerity. We are, therefore, working with federal ministries to ensure that our policies are adequately reflected in the budget 2014-15.

Another important factor is increased focus on achievement of results. In the traditional budgeting system, ministries would primarily focus on pays and procurements. This system lacked focus on performance or results that affect citizens and businesses in an economy.

To modernise this method, the government has introduced ‘Output-based budgeting’ system. In this new method of budgeting, the ministries provide goals, policies (in shape of outputs – services to be delivered, and outcomes – affect of those services on target population) and performance indicators and targets. The method requires ministries to specify the outputs that they would deliver to the public services. The main aim of introducing this method is to improve comprehensiveness of the budget, introduce a system of performance monitoring, and hold officers accountable for the use of public funds. Each year, the government also tables ‘Federal Medium-Term Budget Estimates for Service Delivery’ in Parliament together with other budget books at the time of budget presentation in May / June. This book presents the amounts and the intended purpose (government services e.g. public service delivery, facilitation to the markets, regulations, etc.) in shape of policies and performance details.

Budget forecasts, Budget Strategy Paper and Output Based budgeting are the beginning of a modern system of budgeting. However, more needs to be done to make the system even more transparent, comprehensive and accountable. While the country ratings in openness and transparency (as undertaken through Open Budget Index – an index compiled by non-government organisation for more than 100 countries around the world) have improved from 38 to 58, and ratings assessed through Public Expenditure and Financial Accountability system have gradually increased, the current government intends to roll-out further complementary reforms to make the system even more robust.

Firstly, a system of performance monitoring is being introduced. The moneys spent and the performance achieved against that budgeted / planned is an important step towards measuring performance and introducing a system of accountability for results. Secondly, to improve service delivery a system of delegation of authority is being discussed. In this system, the central controls on budgets and plans will be gradually decentralised and line managers will be given more autonomy and authority to deliver better services to citizens. This will require enhancements in capabilities of planning, budgeting and monitoring at the ministerial level. Thirdly, a public finance administration bill is being drafted to enhance management of public moneys. Fourthly, computerisation of output-based budgeting has started and linkages with the national accounting and budgeting system (called Pifra) are under way. In addition, results based management – where plans, budgets, audits and monitoring systems are aligned with achievement of results – is being planned for introduction.

Embedding new budgeting systems is an institutional reform, which requires structural changes in the way the government works. These changes, therefore, require time and resources for implementation. The current government is, however, determined to make the system conform to the modern systems of planning, budgeting and monitoring to make it transparent, participatory, and policy-focused. At the same time, the government is making efforts to implement its medium-term macroeconomic policy, and I would encourage our businesses to take advantage of our open policies and contribute in job creation for the prosperity of our people.

PM for civil services reforms

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif on Tuesday said the best performing civil servants should be rewarded in order to elevate performance of civil bureaucracy.
The Prime Minister was chairing a high level meeting held here at the PM House to review the civil service reforms.
The meeting was attended by Finance Minister Ishaq Dar, Minister for Planning Ahsan Iqbal and others.
Issuing guidelines for civil service reforms, the Prime Minister said market based compensation should be provided to the best performing civil servants and in this regard the government had no budgetary constraints.
He said the civil servants were working for the development of country and their role was important in providing services to the citizens, hence hard-working government officers deserved to be compensated adequately.
Specialized training should be imparted to various occupational groups of the civil service, he added.
The Prime Minister directed to constitute a sub-committee that would come up with proposals and report.
Earlier, the Prime Minister was given a briefing on compensation, training and promotion of civil servants.
During the briefing, it was stated that compensation should be based on the position, load of work and competency of an officer to deliver successfully.
The Prime Minister was apprised that there were no uniform compensatory packages for civil servants in any country and compensation was based on performance.
It was also stated that best lot of officers needed to be posted at the Federal Secretariat so that policy formulation was improved.
The Prime Minister was apprised that a workable service pyramid with promotion opportunities for capable and hard-working officers was essential to induct and retain best human resources and that there was need for attrition of officers, who were not performing upto standards.
Several proposals were also discussed to improve the performance grading process.