ARTICLE: "Hafeez Sheikh, ROM, has decided not to privatise PIA-owned Roosevelt Hotel in New York and instead approved a joint venture..."
"What's ROM? Not as in Released Ownership of all Material Goods for the sake of transparency and..."
"Well, some say he has given details to the Cabinet Division with the proviso that it not be released to the general public as he is a private citizen and..."
"Don't be facetious - he couldn't have said that, you are improvising..."
"Well, whenever I ask the Cabinet Division for the assets declared by the 20 odd Advisers and Special Assistants (SAPMs) I am given the run around."
"What run around?"
"Well, they say they have set up a committee."
"Don't be facetious."
"OK, so a task-force."
"Who heads it?"
"Don't know."
"You are being facetious; but I know some advisors and SAPMs do not accept a salary payable from the taxpayers' money and therefore need not declare their material goods..."
"Are they resident in the minister's enclave, whose utility bills are picked up by the taxpayers, do they use the services of staff, including a driver, a car and the air conditioned office they sit in..."
"OK, OK, but when I said ROM I meant Resident Outside the Motherland."
"Oh dear God, anyway the latest survey indicates that Shahbaz Sharif is more popular then The Khan."
"I don't believe that."
"There are those who reject the survey's veracity, and let's be honest our surveys cater to the ruling party's wishes while some pundits are quoting the old Shakespeare principle to justify the survey result, you know the one where it's not as if I love Shahbaz Sharif more it's that I love Imran Khan less..."
"You don't agree?"
"No, I reckon non-performance by The Khan administration and the large number of ROMs employed at our expense maybe one factor but the more potent factor is that bashing one's opponents without any break, and let's be honest The Khan and his merry men and women engage in this activity every day, can disenchant a public faster than...negative economic factors and..."
"Phew, so it isn't down to the ROMs"
"Don't be facetious."
Copyright Business Recorder, 2020
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