FINANCE Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb on Tuesday briefed media about progress and targets vis-à-vis the ongoing process of rightsizing of the Federal Government, hoping the entire exercise will be accomplished by the close of the financial year resulting in the substantial saving of expenditure. He said that 60% vacant regular posts that have not come in payroll which stood at 150,000 have been abolished or declared as dying posts, creating a real financial impact. About the job of the high powered committee on rightsizing, the Minister said it will reduce 80 institutions to a half.
It is, perhaps, for the first time that substantive measures are being taken to save tax-payers money through a comprehensive rightsizing exercise aimed at jettisoning unnecessary burden on the national exchequer. The credit for this surely goes to the Finance Minister, who worked hard during the last six months to stabilize the economy and is now implementing strategies to ensure sustainable growth. Tax collection has become a challenging job as influential segments of the society are not willing to pay their due taxes voluntarily and the Government has been meeting its growing funding needs through burdening the existing tax-payers. In view of high tax rates and a multitude of taxes, there is growing concern among people that the money so raised is not judiciously being spent. The Finance Minister, who has a rich background of financial management in the private sector, is fully resolved to implement the vision of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif about rightsizing the Government aimed at saving money and improving efficiency and output. No one would object if ministries, divisions and departments created on considerations other than merit and interest of the country are either merged or abolished as savings so achieved could be utilized to improve remuneration for those who are productively involved in different ministries and institutions. However, it is strange that some important points and issues raised frequently by experts and people of Pakistan are being ignored while carrying out reforms to restructure the federal government. As has been stated by the Finance Minister, eighty institutions are planned to be reduced to a half but at the same time we hear reports on a regular basis about plans and approvals given by different forums and governmental authorities for creation of new entities and that too in the presence of bodies engaged in similar pursuits. It is generally believed that at times new entities are created just to accommodate blue-eyed people or make additions to the Federal Cabinet. History sheets of various ministries would show they were merged with other ministries and divisions many times and then declared as stand alone entities again. Similarly, under the famous 18th Constitutional Amendment a number of subjects and institutions were devolved to the provinces but with the passage of time many of them were re-created at the federal level on different pretexts. There is a legitimate demand that all these ministries and institutions should be abolished altogether at the federal level and transferred to the provinces as this should result in significant savings. As for abolition of a large number of posts, the criteria for abolition (that those which remained vacant for the last three years) is not prudent as posts remained vacant not because there was no need to fill them but because of the continued ban on recruitment and the cumbersome procedure adopted to get approval for fresh hiring. There are apprehensions that this wholesale abolition of posts will impact on the overall performance of the relevant ministries and departments. Privatization of non-core services is also flawed as these non-core services like cleaning are as important as core services as these have a bearing on the overall environment and especially health of the manpower. The CDA has assigned the job of cleaning and garbage lifting to private contractors in rural areas but heaps of filth on main roads of the capital is clear evidence that the private sector is no better than the public sector without efficient monitoring and accountability.
