Caretaker govt’s performance
The institution of a caretaker setup ahead of general elections is a unique practice peculiar to Pakistan an interim setup that is alien to other democracies in the world. This novel exercise seems to stem from the belief that the caretaker government will remain neutral while overseeing the smooth conduct of elections.The caretaker’s tenure has historically remained confined to 60 days as given in the constitution, with a limited mandate to facilitate the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to hold free, fair and transparent elections, keeping itself away from influencing the election results, with all kinds of strategic decisions of economic and administrative nature remaining outside its ambit.
But, going against the grain and deviating from the past tradition, this time around, the caretaker government has remained in the saddle for almost seven months duly mandated to take strategic decisions unheard of in the history of caretaker setup, like holding negotiations with IMF, privatization of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) like PIA, Pakistan Steel Mill (PSM), etc which have been running into losses and surviving on financial bailout, though, it couldn’t accomplish the privatization process despite completing lot of groundwork in this regard, especially in the case of Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), restructuring the FBR which again remained unaccomplished due to stiff resistance from the relevant department and much-controversial pension reforms and so on.
As for important measures taken to prepare ground for economic stability, the caretaker government has taken various important initiatives to attract foreign investment with main focus on Gulf countries like Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar through the newly-established Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC). In this connection, the caretaker setup while working hand in glove with the establishment, has bolstered the newly-established Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC) and has taken a giant leap forward in this direction. In this regard, regular meetings were held to review the progress on this front.
It may be mentioned here that SIFC has set an ambitious target of attracting 100 billion dollar worth foreign investment in the next five years.Though, the target sounds over ambitious, yet everything is achievable if their is an iron will and dogged determination.
Another major challenge which the caretaker government had to confront head-on immediately after assuming office, and which has been eating into the vitals of this hapless nation and has remained elephant in the room posing formidable challenges for successive governments and which they deemed it convenient to look the other way, is none else but the infamous energy sector with its incompetent and incorrigible power distribution companies commonly known as ‘Discos’ causing electricity theft and lion losses worth billions of rupees that has sucked the blood of the hapless consumers to the last drop. In this regard, the caretaker government after several rounds of sessions and after detailed deliberations over whether provinces should take control of the loss-making Discos, the caretaker cabinet has finally taken the tough decision to hand over management of these blood-sucking companies to the private sector on a long-term basis, although this kind of practice undertaken in the shape of handing over the K-Electric to a foreign a company has failed to produce the desired results with Karachiites suffering as ever.
In order to deal with Discos issue, there was another proposal of setting up a Performance Management Unit (PMU) to be headed by a serving senior army officer but it couldn’t materialize because reportedly, army high command was not favourably inclined to the proposal and also because it was considered to be not a long-term solution.
Coming to comparison between the caretaker government’s performance and that of the erstwhile PDM coalition government led by Shahbaz Sharif, if we draw a discreet comparison between the caretaker’s performance and that of PDM’s coalition, we find the caretaker government’s performance far better as it succeeded to stem the galloping inflation to some extent which had started during Shahbaz Sharif’s coalition government and had broken the back of a common man. Besides, the caretakers took important measures that helped the country’s economic health turning for the better. We see a slight economic stability with rupee performing robustly against US dollar during caretaker setup.
Moreover, effective check on dollar smuggling and a ruthless crackdown on various mafias including ‘kunda mafia’ and sugar mafia operating with complete impunity, has created an economic environment that has given confidence to investors in stock market and other business activities. It may be noted that robust performance by stock market of any country is taken as a barometer of its economic stability.
Coming to the future coalition of the newly-elected government headed by Shahbaz Sharif, it will face daunting political, economic and security challenges as the country is not out of the wood yet and facing the looming risk of an economic default despite all positive economic indicators. Bringing political harmony, dealing with IMF successfully which is necessary for opening the door for securing foreign loans and financial assistance from other financial institutions like World Bank, Asian Development Bank and other friendly countries that would become instrumental to achieve economic stability and stave off the risk of default. Besides, maintaining effective law and order, creating an enabling environment for both domestic and foreign investment, managing the abiding energy/gas crisis plaguing the hapless consumers day in and day out, bringing down the ever-surging inflation, providing economic relief to the public, and so on, are some of the intimidating challenges the new government is destined to face.
Lastly, steering the country out of the deep economic mire will be a litmus test for the seemingly weak coalition government of Shahbaz Sharif. Shahbaz Sharif’s success or failure will greatly depend on his ability to select a strong economic team. If he succeeds in choosing a team of professionals and sheds his dependence on Ishaq Dar and his cohort, he will be better poised to acquit himself well and steer the country out of economic crisis.