Pakistan: Corruption Or Incompetence – OpEd
Pakistan’s recurring economic meltdowns and multiple International Monetary Fund (IMF) programs can nearly always be attributed to the country’s profligate expenditure and budget deficits. Pakistan is at the apex of IMF bailout packages with a total tally of 23 arrangements in seventy-three years of membership. Myopic governments who traverse to the IMF headquarters alert us that we need economic exigency to cope with high inflation, devaluation of the currency, and increased taxes. Yet we’re still in an unremitting cycle. We start with an impending economic crisis that leads to the trespass in the IMF program conditions due to the political climate, which compels us back to its doorsteps, starts negotiations, and drives to engender stringent measures and we’re back to square one. A Plethora of explanations is offered to identify the state policy decisions that, over time, hurt the economy.
The root causes of our economic woes are more than often put on either end of a spectrum-Corruption or Incompetence. But which one is it or both? The newfangled wave of economic crunch exhibits that the problem of meltdown lies somewhere between the spectrum. The riposte to the question of Corruption and Incompetence: Both. 75 years of distasteful history corroborate that the country has grappled with the questions of Constitutional crisis, Political paralysis, economic meltdowns, resurgent terrorism, and institutional breakdowns. But to deal with it all at once so vehemently only exasperates the situation.
Corruption was always an underlying issue of Pakistan’s economic dilemmas. According to the Transparency International Corruption Perception Index 2022, Pakistan ranked 140 out of 180 states. A decade-ago analysis by former NAB chairman Fasih Bokhari revealed that Pakistan incurs a hefty loss of $7 billion per day due to it. One can only imagine how scary the numbers are today. The political elite is facing uncountable numbers of the corruption case. The disclosure of a fraction of Panama Paper in 2016, listing 259 Pakistanis, ruling political and business elite as the beneficiaries of offshore holdings, indicates the cost Pakistani pays for the lavish lifestyles of the 1%. The recent release of Toshakhana records of the last 21 years demonstrates how Politicians are showering themselves with expensive gifts at the cost of the poor public. These are only a drop in the ocean. Economic stress induced by years of corruption inflicts pain on Pakistani households. Because “Corruption doesn’t just skew income distribution, it makes us all poorer”. However, the Political elite are least interested in our problems the only thing that matters to them is the secure of power at every cost which exhibits their incompetence and lack of willingness towards problem-solving.
Customarily, the incompetence of the political elite is often veiled by corruption. Pakistan’s economy is not only improvised by corruption but the incompetence of officeholders. Nepotism and dynasties that run in Pakistan’s political structure, with fake degree holders and ill-equipped allotments of public offices have affected the economy for decades. The inability of politicians to handle the situation effectively causes chaos and instability in the state. The only way out understood to our leaders is not even done properly. The IMF deal negotiations paint a perfect picture of the incompetence of politicians as the state is on the verge of default and with all hands, on the table, no one can crack it down. The pressure to implement its articles without any deal is further deteriorating the economic situation and causing restlessness. Despite the economic turmoil, the only concern for every political party is the attainment of power.
As British poet~ Percy Bysshe Shelley describes, Power like a desolating pestilence, pollutes whatever it touches. Pakistani politicians are indulging in power games that the economic distress stands somewhere behind. People often choose only one side of the spectrum and justify our economic restlessness, but incompetence and corruption go hand in hand. An incompetent public office holder is unequivocally due to corruption and a corrupt office holder is simply due to structural and individual incompetence. Pakistan’s economy is standing at the edge of a cliff due to this never-ending cycle. It’s high time we start choosing the right person for the right job, rather than a bunch of power grabbers who don’t understand the problem.
Musfirah Rashid is a Quaid e Azam University graduate, working as a Research Intern with Islamabad Policy Research Institute (IPRI), and focuses extensively on Human Security and Geopolitics. She can be reacxhed at [email protected] Twitter: @musfirah_rashidx
