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Airports in private hands
THE government decision to ‘outsource’ the operations and land assets of the three main airports in Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad is a welcome development, and anticipates a significantly large investment from Qatar. That the government has decided to transfer these airports to private operators through public-private partnership, instead of going for outright privatisation, will help it circumvent long and tedious processes and avoid controversies associated with such policy actions in Pakistan. The Economic Coordination Committee has also approved the hiring of the International Finance Corporation — the private sector arm of the World Bank Group — as transaction adviser, which shows that the authorities are trying to expedite matters. Nonetheless, it is difficult to expect the whole process to conclude without any challenge from domestic airlines and the political opposition.
The trend to privatise, or transfer the management and operations of airports to private investors or private operators, has been growing worldwide since the early 1980s. This has both its advantages and disadvantages. But studies on such experiments elsewhere have shown that the benefits far outweigh the costs. The main benefit of any form of privatisation is the fact that it increases efficiency through investment in technology and the automation of processes to provide passengers reliable and less costly services. As the number of passengers travelling by air rises, the present infrastructure at Pakistani airports is coming apart. The situation requires massive capital investment in expansion and upgradation. With the government strapped for cash, private operators are in a better position to determine when and where to spend money to improve service delivery in order to facilitate the passengers without burdening taxpayers. The handing over of these airports to private operators should hopefully pave the way for more foreign airlines too begin flight operations in Pakistan or use one of the airports as their regional hub. If that happens, it will be a huge boost to the local tourism industry.
Published in Dawn, April 1st, 2023
No more freebies
PERHAPS amongst the major reasons Pakistan is fighting to maintain financial solvency today is that its rapacious elite have, for decades, lived like royalty while the hapless masses slaved away. Moreover, whenever noises are made about austerity, it is the poor and the overstretched middle classes that are told to bear the brunt ‘in the national interest’, while the elite continue to live it up. This hypocrisy must end. One small step in the right direction is the Public Accounts Committee’s recent call to do away with free electricity for officers from grades 16 to 22. This will reportedly save the state Rs9bn a year. As the PAC chairman rightly said, the free electricity facility “should be discontinued for judges and generals alike”. The bottom line is that whether it is electricity, fuel or other utilities and services, all citizens, including our civilian and military bureaucracies, must pay for what they consume. The only exception where subsidies can be considered is for the poorest of the poor — those who are battling to put food on the table. For everyone else, the freeloading must end if we are to truly break the ‘begging bowl’, and live as a self-respecting state.
But old habits die hard. The elite in Pakistan are used to living lives of luxury subsidised by the taxpayer. For example, as pointed out in a UNDP report, the total privileges enjoyed by “Pakistan’s most powerful groups” came to a whopping Rs2,660bn in 2017-18. That is no mean amount. Amongst the beneficiaries of this largesse, the report says, are feudals, the corporate class, the rich, state-owned enterprises and the military. It is these sectors, which have political and economic power in Pakistan, that need to shed their taste for luxury provided by the taxpayer. Efforts have been made to trim the fat. For example, the prime minister launched an austerity drive in February; yet, as the monitoring committee noted some weeks after, cabinet members and senior bureaucrats had not given up their use of expensive, fuel-guzzling cars. If the state is serious about austerity, real change needs to start at the top, with politicians, the military and the bureaucracy leading the way. The mantra should be simple: live within your means, and shed this addiction to luxury financed by foreign loans and the common man’s toil.
Published in Dawn, April 1st, 2023
Courting controversy
WHERE and, perhaps more importantly, when does it end? It had been hoped that the judiciary would keep a level head while others all around them were losing theirs.
However, it seems that even the wisest among us cannot help but succumb to the afflictions of the body politic. The unseemly drama that has played out in the highest court of the land this week seems to have drained the Pakistani people of whatever residual hope they had of seeing sanity restored to the country anytime soon.
One continues to hope, however, that the differences between the esteemed judges are purely academic and philosophical and not, as some would have us believe, over any personal resentments. The nation has seen enough bile spewed in the political arena to have the stomach for another ugly schism.
Never before has the top court appeared this polarised, not even when it was meekly stamping its approval on the treasonous acts of dictators past. Is this really the hoped-for dawn of judicial independence? Right now, it is very difficult to tell.
Meanwhile, the credibility and integrity of the court continue to be undermined on a daily basis as politicians and political camps openly declare favourites. It is obvious that ordinary people can no longer decide whom to trust. Perhaps this was bound to happen.
The ‘great unravelling’ triggered by the dismantling of the PTI regime last April was perhaps bound to unravel the country’s top court as well.
After all, the PTI had climbed to power on the back of several judgements that cut the feet out from under its political opposition. Yet, to think that the Supreme Court and its workings would be seen as crudely politicised in a bid to ‘even the scales’ could not have been anticipated.
A fundamental question of overriding public interest continues to remain unanswered: if the Constitution has prescribed elections to dissolved assemblies within 90 days, why are they not being held? The Supreme Court ought to have spoken as one voice on the matter.
Instead, Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial appears reluctant to form a full-court bench, and matters are now coming to a head. The subsequent commentary from interested quarters has given the divisions within the Supreme Court a political colour. This is bad not just for the sitting chief justice, but also for the incoming one.
The country cannot afford any of its top judges to be seen to be associated with one political narrative or the other. It bears repeating that they must immediately resolve their differences amongst themselves in order to present a united front to the other branches of the state. An openly divided judiciary cannot serve as a check on the executive and legislature in any meaningful way.
Published in Dawn, April 1st, 2023