A ray of hope

It is unfortunate but true that a vast majority of our population has to face the pain of extreme poverty. A large number of families go hungry, move about barefooted and in rags, live in shanties, go without medicines when down with disease, send their children to earn a living instead of sending them to school and even commit suicide when utterly disappointed with life because of pecuniary compulsions.
The debate about the reasons for such a state of affairs and the remedy to redress the situation has been going on for a long time but the problem has been getting worse over the years.
The treatment meted out to the poor people in government schools, public sector hospitals and even at the police stations is more horrible now that it was about two decades ago.
To talk about poverty alleviation and good governance at higher level of government has become a façade to please the multilateral agencies or for other purposes.
The promise of this lollipop, however, does not bring smiles on the faces of ordinary people because they know better and are losing hope. Of course the size of PSDP has been somewhat increased in the budgets but most of it is either not utilised during the course of the year or is pocketed by government officials or contractors assigned to do the job.
Even Zakat funds are reported to have been misappropriated. This is criminal but criminals of all hues are having very good days in Pakistan.
Utterly disgusted with the irrelevance of the government to effect a change and extremely pained with the pathetic condition of the down-trodden people, some brave souls have ventured in the field and taken upon themselves to make a difference without looking to the government or some other resourceful authorities for patronage. Strangely enough, they don't have political ambitions or affiliations. They don't even aspire for fame but are simply driven by a passion.
The latest State Bank's quarterly report contains a special section on an initiative taken by The Citizens Foundation for Promoting Quality Education for the Poor which is quite revealing. Realising that low level of education is one of the most important determinants of poverty and education system in Pakistan faces the problem of service provision such as unaffordable access, non-functioning schools and low quality, The Citizens Foundation (TCF) founded in 1995 has established 140 primary and secondary schools with 18,000 schools enrolments for providing quality education in underprivileged areas of Pakistan.
The mission is to provide quality education to children from destitute and poor families at the primary and secondary levels in an environment that encourages intellectual, moral and spiritual growth.
This would equip children with knowledge and skills which would inspire them to play an effective role in the society. The long-term vision is to establish 1000 schools in less privileged areas of Pakistan and cater to 350,000 children mainly from poor families.
The construction cost of a model primary school is Rs 3.3 million while its recurring expenses are Rs 0.6 million per annum.
Fee structure is so structured that no student is denied schooling due to inability to pay and scholarships are also awarded. Students who come from urban slums and are undernourished are provided two glasses of milk in a week.
A field study was undertaken by the State Bank to assess the benefits of TCF initiative. Judging from a variety of indicators, the performance, measured in terms of objectives, was quite satisfactory.
The performance criteria included the status of parents, student-to-teacher ratio and matric results.
However, the financing aspect was somewhat disquietening as the main source of financing of TCF schools which happened to be donations was uncertain. Nevertheless, the balance of accounts clearly showed that TCF has been living well within its means as its budget has remained in surplus since inception.
Notably, donations have been growing remarkably by an average growth rate of 31.5 percent per annum over the past eight years. TCF schools, however, could be threatened if donations dried up in future.
The State Bank concludes that despite success of such initiatives, the importance of the role of the public sector should not be downplayed.
However, in view of several factors like paucity of funds, and acknowledged weaknesses in implementation of development programmes, the government could also look to facilitating and strengthening the non-profit organisations in private sector to maximise the provision of quality education to the children from poor families.
The success of TCF has also encouraged the State Bank to float another idea. In order to overcome the problem of lack of implementation capacity in accelerating development expenditures, "government could seek to take advantage of the managerial capacity available with reputable established private sector social service providers."
In its study, the State Bank also mentioned initiatives taken by other NGOs including Bunyad Literacy Community Council, The Quality School Foundation, Northern Pakistan Education Programme and Farhan Educational Society.
Impressed with the performance of TCF, Unilever Pakistan has also started contributing towards their effort. Students studying in government schools have no proper access to information technology and find themselves left behind in the race to build skills and experience in the wired world.
In order to remove this deficiency, Unilever, has initiated a comprehensive IT training programme for teachers in different branches of TCF in order to make them computer literate so that they can help their students gain much needed advantage in the job market.
This is one of the many projects sponsored by highly motivated people and highlighted by the State Bank. There are many others doing excellent jobs in different fields with a lot of effect.
The examples of Edhi Trust, Aalamgir Trust and Ansar Burni Trust readily come to mind. The efficiency of certain government departments has deteriorated to an extent that they have abdicated their responsibility to undertake the assigned jobs.
While police stations squabble over their jurisdiction, ambulances of Edhi Trust quietly shift the injured from the scene of the accident to the hospitals. Dead bodies and other victims are also properly taken care of. Poor cancer patients would die untreated if Shaukat Khanam Hospital was not there.
One shudders to think what would happen to the brutalised girls and other unfortunate sufferers if their services were not freely available to the society. In most cases these voluntary organisations are so selfless that they don't expect or even desire official assistance but survive on donations or the resources of their own members.
Although no definitive conclusions could be derived yet learning from the experience of Pakistan, certain generalisations could be confidently made. The same amount of resources could prove to be much more effective for the delivery of much needed services if the mode of their utilisation is changed.
Government sector cannot obviously deliver because of corruption, mismanagement and inertia while committed NGOs could perform miracles despite heavy odds. The bulk of civil servants comprise those with low skill levels and hardly interested in alleviating the miseries of the poor.
Instead, they concentrate their energies on acquiring high profile assignments which could improve their prospects for promotions and juicy jobs. While this is true, there are clear indications of increasing fiscal space in the coming years to redress the social sector shortfalls expeditiously. Due to lack of implementation capacity in the public sector, State Bank has come up with the idea of taking advantage of the managerial capacity available with reputable established private sector social sector providers.
However, how to spot the right people in the private sector to provide the services and what should be their relationship with the government agencies or performance criteria has not been explained. Probably, this part of the exercise won't be straightforward because it is not easy for the government bureaucracy to share its domain with the outsiders.
Nevertheless, the State Bank has floated an idea which if properly thought through and appropriately designed and implemented could provide the much needed relief to the poor people of this country and at least keep their hope alive.
The devolution of power to the local level has also provided the opportunity to the District Nazims to experiment with such ideas in order to maximise the gains from the limited resources placed at their disposal. If such experiments are perceived to be successful, more resources may be forthcoming from donations etc. People in Pakistan are very generous if they are convinced about the rightness of the cause.
Government could help the effort by improving and streamlining some of its procedures and be more receptive with funding for the social sectors. For instance, at present, contributions to only famous and well-connected NGOs duly notified by the government are exempted from income tax.
The certification process needs to be made more embracing and transparent in order to encourage donations and recognise the role of NGOs in improving human conditions in the country. Centre for Philanthropy has already been approved by the CBR to undertake the task of processing of applications from NGOs and recommend to CBR for issuance of the tax exemption certificate.
The Chief of Income Tax or his representative is a member of the certification panel and a checklist of the requirement of the law has been agreed between the CBR and the Centre.
This, in our view, is a good beginning. Since a CBR official is associated with the exercise to ensure that the NGOs meet the necessary criteria and fulfilled all the conditions like transparency of operations and auditing of accounts at regular intervals, there should not be any unnecessary delay in issuance of the certificate.
Pakistanis working abroad as well as the business houses locally can make good use of this. It would provide them comfort that their donations are really being used for a cause dear to them.
There is of course a need to come up with even more imaginative ways to improve the working and extend the coverage of NGOs to alleviate the suffering of poverty-stricken people in the country.