Discussion held on Public-Private Partnership

Mass mobilisation has been imperative to pressurise government for effective response to the problems of people.
This had been the consensus evolved by the speakers of discussion on 'Promise and Challenge of Public-Private Partnership (PPP) in Pakistan' organised by the Trainers Resource Group (TRG), in association with Human Resource Development Network (HRDN) and TCS Pvt Ltd on Thursday.
The speakers had been of the view that unless people ceased to rely on quick solutions and costly alternatives for their problems and build pressure on the government, it remained unable to deliver them.
They observed that instead of trying to replace the government, the private and NGO sectors should utilise its expertise to make mass level/mass contacts to awaken the people for the proper and sustainable solution of their problems.
However, some divergent views had also emerged among the panelists earlier when the Sindh Chief Secretary Aslam Sanjarani had rejected the impression that the PPP could be a prospective solution for the long-standing problems of the people.
He had observed that the core business of private sector had been to remain focused on its earnings and as such its service/delivery scale had been quite limited. He said that none of the private sector organisations had been committed to reach out to the remote areas of the country and serve the underprivileged class.
Similarly, Director Sindh Education Foundation Mashhood Rizvi observed that instead of replacing the government with private sector, NGOs and other private sector organisations should mobilise masses, create awareness in them to put pressure on the government to improve its working.
He called for judicious distribution of wealth and fair degree of accountability on the part of government officials. He urged on private sector to improve the already existing social sector infrastructure of the country rather than to open new schools, hospitals etc.
Development Economist Akbar Zaidi viewed that the entry of private sector into public sector development works like health, education etc led the government stray and free from all pressure to serve the masses.
In contrast, the General Manager Human Resources Shell Pakistan Limited Leon Menezes and Executive Director Indus Resource Centre Sadiqa Salahuddin highlighted the important role of private and non-governmental sector in the social development of a civil society.
Leon also counted many of development works undertaken by his company as the social corporate responsibility.
He was of the view that PPP could be proved very beneficial to society and the government should offload its holdings from different corporations as it had nothing to do with running of a business.
Bridging the gap, Barrister Shahida Jamil adopted a bit flexible stance to accommodate both the parties. She said that PPP could be an effective tool to serve the society in a better way.
He stressed the government should focus on creating a conducive environment while NGOs concentrating on mobilising the civil society to compel the public sector to perform better.