Manifestos: financing social services

Those political manifestos are not a priority this time round is abundantly obvious by how close to elections these have been announced. The three mainstream parties have announced their manifestos less than one month before the election date.

Nevertheless, as political maneuvering and confrontation has taken center stage on popular media, public scrutiny of parties’ socio-economic agendas seem to have disappeared in the commotion. In a politically charged environment, it becomes incumbent upon policy research circles to offer comparative analysis of party manifestos and hold them accountable when they fail to deliver.
The social agenda of the two main race horses is a bag of mixed promises, with few distinctive notions. Let’s start with the perceived government-in-waiting, PTI. The party makes much of the failure of the ‘status quo’ to deliver basic services to the electorate but fails to make any cogent commitment to increase the budgetary allocation for health and education sector.

There exists near universal consensus that these sectors are under-funded at both national and provincial levels. The only explanation one could offer for this omission is that the lack of fiscal space does not warrant expansion of development budget in coming years and the party is acting pragmatically by promising little.

But grand promises have been made nevertheless, and in absence of any increases in budgetary allocation one could only assume that the same will be achieved by reallocation of existing resources. For example, universal healthcare coverage is promised through by means of insurance coverage. Similarly, Lady Health Worker and vaccination programs are planned to be doubled in size, alongside an incentive program to attract better quality human resource in healthcare.

Education is a similar story. Recognizing that the private schools have entrenched themselves deep into the system, the party plans to coopt them by promising vouchers for low income students to study at privately owned schools. Education fund is promised for entrepreneurs to expand access to education through technology, alongside a plan to induct foreign educated teachers into the public system. Commitment has also been made to establish at least 10 technical universities. While the ideas put forward are commendable, it remains unclear which existing programs will the party axe to mobilize funds for its proposals.

Contrast this with PML-N, which rarely dares to boast of its delivery in social services, instead focusing on the safe confines of infrastructure development record. Thankfully, the party has finally dared to dream bigger. Its manifesto fares better in that it makes quantified promises.

Start off with resource allocations: commitment is made to increase spending on healthcare and education up to two and four percent of GDP, respectively. This means that spending on education will double whereas that on health will increase four times: no small feat.

The health section places high emphasis on mother and child support program: reducing rate of maternal and infant mortality by 25 percent, a dedicated ambulance service for pregnant women, and increasing vaccination and skilled-birth attendant rates up to 90 percent. The party commits to brings population growth rate down to 1.6 percent from current two percent by the end of its next tenure. Addressing childhood malnutrition during the first three years of childhood has also been made part of the agenda.

Sadly, the education section of PML-N’s manifesto fails to live up to similar standards. While commitments are made to ensure universal primary education, and to usher a “teaching revolution”, no firm targets in the form of numbers are made for basic education. Promises of introducing a “modern class room”, increasing scholarships on need-basis, and regulating the private sectors appear fanciful. A lack of firm targets makes it abundantly clear that the section was written without much “homework”.

Any analysis of election pledges does in no way lessen the significance of actual service delivery. “Plans of action” mean little without actual action. However, setting of firm targets in the manifesto allows the electorate to hold parties accountable by giving a benchmark to compare their performance against. In this regard, the incumbents seem to have done a better job.