Ostentation, lavish living, wasting and plundering public money, misuse of powers - just to mention a few - are well-known traits of our rulers and government officials, certainly with some notable exceptions. The word austerity is not in the dictionary of high-level civil military bureaucracy, public office-holders and even the public at large - even with little affluence.
This habit of living beyond means has made us a nation with the beggar's bowl. The lenders, when see lifestyle of our ruling elite, immediately show indignation - it is hard to believe for them that a nation living on loans and grants has such an flamboyant way of spending.
The wasteful spending out of taxes, collected from the poor, is playing havoc with economy as well as the socio-economic fabric of society. Behind the present chaotic socio-economic and political situation in Pakistan, amongst other factors, is an increasing gulf between the rich and the poor. It is shocking that with every passing day, more and more people are being pushed below the poverty line - their total number is now not less that 45 million in a country where rulers unashamedly waste billions of rupees on their personal comfort and in the name of security. One of the major weaknesses of governance in Pakistan is unchecked wasteful spending. The worsening plight of the poor is not because of shortage in revenues or available state resources - as propagated by the rulers to shift blame on others - but is due to wasteful expenses on the part of the rulers and their mediocre bureaucracy.
In fiscal year 2009-10, total tax revenue collected by the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) was around Rs 1320 billion. The federal government showed total receipts (both tax and non-tax) at Rs2426.7 billion. Expenditures - current plus development - were Rs 6040 billion, out of which non-development outlays were to the tune of Rs 3746 billion. Debt servicing alone risen to Rs 950 billion from budgeted amount of Rs 780 billion. For financial year 2009-10, a cursory look at Annual Budget Statement reveals a disturbing story. Analysis of two sizeable volumes, prepared and published by the Finance Division, Ministry of Finance, commonly called the "Pink Book", shows how public money is wasted on unproductive, unnecessary monstrous federal government offices when millions of people are homeless and foodless.
The details of the expenditure included in this publication captioned "Details of Demands for Grants and Appropriations" are simply horrifying. We have over 50 ministries and 135 divisions, sub-divisions, attached offices and allied departments. The government in budget 2009-10 just demanded Rs 400,000 for adoption of Urdu language as official language [Page 11, Volume I, Pink Book] whereas for travel and transportation of federal ministers alone total allocation if that of Rs 47,044,000 [Page 10, Volume I, Pink Book]. Total money given to the apex court in the budget 2008-09 was Rs 354,500,000, whereas the entertainment expenditure of the President and Prime Minister houses was over Rs 220,700,000.
Budget sanction of Meteorology Department is Rs 417,000,000; Council of Islamic Ideology Rs 52,280,000 and Model Deeni Madaris Rs 29,287,000 - their contribution towards public hardly justifies such spending. On the contrary, the total money spared for Scientific and Technological Division of the Ministry of Science and Technology is just Rs 298,838,000 and that too not for research, but for operational expenses. It is a national shame to note that total budget of this vital ministry is only Rs 3,076,070,000, out of which not a single penny is earmarked for research projects.
Details for demands provided in 'Current Expenditure' (Volume I) and 'Development Expenditure' (Volume II) of Pink Book confirm beyond doubt that billion of rupees are being wasted in the most ruthless manner. The Secretary to the government of Pakistan, Salam Siddique, in his preface to this book, has observed, "For day-to-day working of the ministries and their departments, this document becomes the basic reference point for expenditure management and control."
One wonders what kinds of control and management he is talking about. The Auditor General of Pakistan, in his annual reports, has time and again mentioned that all rules and regulations are blatantly violated and the national exchequer suffered loss of billion of rupees. Yet nobody was convicted - rather the worst offenders got pardon under the infamous NRO (what a misnomer withdrawing cases of looters of national wealth in the name of political expediency).
The following examples for additional grants, taken from Pink Book, are not only eye-opener but also testify to the wasting and plundering of public money by the politicians and bureaucrats:
The PM Secretariat got additional grant or Rs 76,656,000 for establishing camp offices at Lahore and Multan for the Prime Minister. At both the places, we already have palatial government buildings, yet the Prime Minister of this starving debt-enslaved nation wants to spent million of rupees for aristocratic, high-born, grand, exclusive camp offices. Special grant (in addition to regular budget) of Rs 300,000,000 is given for transfer of Special Initiative Wing to Cabinet Division - one wonders what the need of this wing is.
Cabinet Division got supplementary grant of Rs 22,000,000 for Central Pool of Cars for Ministers and State Ministers etc. They are not ready to improve and use public transport system. Further grant of Rs 21,063,000 was given to Cabinet Division to meet shortfall of funds in Main Secretariat.
A sum of Rs 15,000,000 was sanctioned by the National Assembly as additional grant to "publicity campaign" for Prime Minister Special Fund for victims of terrorism. Do we need publicity for such a cause. The inefficient and incompetent NAB - as adjudged by the apex court - has got Rs 55,804,000 in addition to regular budget grant just to meet shortfall in budget of the NAB, Islamabad. It also managed to get supplementary grant of Rs 22,064,000 to receive its "shares in recoveries" (Islamabad office alone). This is a unique governmental agency that get share in recoveries - though this is its prime duty and function to recoup such losses - whereas all its expenses are also met from the taxpayers' money. The extra grants that the NAB has extorted in budget 2009-10 from taxpayers' money for its many other offices are: Sindh (Rs 35,094,000), Punjab (Rs 3 4,997,000), KP (Rs 23,967,000), Balochistan (Rs 12,692,000), Rawalpindi (Rs 23,020,000) and Gilgit (Rs 687,000).
Under Demand No 025 [Defence Services], a huge sum of Rs 13,612,717,000 has been sanctioned under the title "Essential requirement of Defence Services" but no descriptions in terms of items have been given. Defence Production Unit (demand No 26) depicts additional grant of Rs 1,761,196,000 for debt servicing of a loan. The details of loans, the purpose for which it was acquired etc have not been disclosed.
Rulers of the day are not inclined to live like a common man. They are not ready to surrender all the perks and privileges they are enjoying at the cost of taxpayers' money despite the facts that over 20 million people are homeless, foodless after the devastating floods. Billions of rupees are required for their rehabilitation, but neither the rich are taxed to meet this expenditure nor rulers are ready to cut all their expenses by at least 50% and learn living within means.
Democracy and responsibility towards people, who vote for parliament, are interconnected. The concept of modern egalitarian state emerges from the sovereign right of the parliament to levy taxes [Article 77 of the Constitution of Pakistan]. But at the same time, it has to spend the same for public welfare rather than for personal comfort and self-aggrandisement. The second part of democracy is completely missing in Pakistan.
(The writers, authors of many books and tax advisers, are members of Visiting Professors at Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS).)
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