UN Public Service Day

The United Nations' 'Public Service Day' was celebrated on Tuesday, as it is marked every year on June 23, with the theme "Developing an Excellent Public Service Your Responsibility, My Responsibility." It was on December 20, 2002, that the United Nations General Assembly designated June 23 of each year as United Nations' Public Service Day.
An idea of how effectively and sincerely this special day has been promoted may be had from the reports of its first observance at the UN Headquarters in New York in 2003. For one thing, it will be noted that the Division for Public Administration and Development Management, with which rests the responsibility for administering the awards and promoting Public Service Day, also includes a programme of technical assistance in the field of governance.
Notably, as such, rewards were presented on that initial stage, to the deserving countries identified for their performance to the government departments, listed by category. These included the Ministry of Interior, Greece; Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore, Singapore; Muscat Municipality, Oman; and National Customs Service, Bolivia, for the Improvement of Public Service.
Similarly for the Improvement of Quality of Public Service Process, the awards went to the Municipal Government of Alcobendas, Spain; Ministry of State for Administrative Development, Egypt; Legal Policy Division, Ministry of Law, Singapore; and the Integral Development of the Family System, Tamaulipas, Mexico.
Moreover, the recipients of the award for Innovations in Public Service were the Public Administration Department for Efficiency in the Administrations, Italy; Patents and Companies Registration Office, Zambia; Public Procurement Service (PPS), South Korea; City of Vancouver, Canada; Education Centre for Research and Development, Lebanon; and Internal Tax Service, Chile.
Since then, many other countries from the developed and developing world, perhaps, Pakistan and India, besides others, might have bagged a few awards too. But so far as Pakistan is concerned, regrettably, little indication of it has been visibly there, thus far, not even now, while celebrating this day.
As this day was, basically, created to celebrate the value and virtue of the public service to the community and to bring to the fore the contribution of public service in the development process, besides recognising the work of public servants and encourage young people to pursue careers in the public sector, the member states were urged to organise special events on this day to highlight the contribution of the public service in the development process.
More to this, as it recognises that democracy and successful governance are built on the foundation of a competent civil service, the day aims to celebrate the value and virtue of service to the community. As such, the lack of evidence of enthusiasm in this count can be attributed to wanton disregard of democracy over long decades. It will, however, be in the fitness of things for the elected government, which has come to power after tremendous sacrifices, to celebrate the day in the desired manner.
After all, the worth and value of democracy lies in the urges and aspirations of a society to maintain safety and essential public services, protect human rights, maintain an efficient framework for market activities and to hold free and fair elections, which draws on the skills and sense of purpose of public servants working as a team. It goes without saying that in the absence of an effective civil administration, democracy and prosperity virtually remain a dream.