The Economic Advisory Council (EAC) constituted by Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi has no legal value and it will not have any role in the budget making process and economic policies during the remaining two months tenure of the present government.
Sources said if the government was serious in taking input from economic experts in budget making process and economic policymaking, it would have reconstituted it long ago as is the case in the USA where such a body is formed for a long-term to provide input in economic policymaking to the government.
An official of Finance Ministry on condition of anonymity stated that EAC is like a debating club which meets once or twice a year where economic experts give their suggestions to the government and it is up to the government to accept or reject them. If some of the proposals are accepted by the government, it takes months to incorporate them in the policy and then it takes even longer time for their implementation.
He said that EAC had neither any role in the past nor will it have a role in the budget making process in the future, as the exercise is done by the bureaucracy on the directions of the government. He said no one knows the purpose behind reconstituting the EAC when there are only two months left in the government's tenure.
When Business Recorder contacted some members of previous EAC, they refused to comment on the effectives of EAC, saying that their comments will be considered as biased.
However when contacted, a former finance secretary said that EAC is not a legal entity and did not have any role in the budget or policymaking in the past. By reconstituting EAC, the government wants to pretend that the budget was prepared after a detailed consultative process with independent economists while reality is that sitting government does not have the right to present the budget for the next fiscal year when it is not in the office from June 1, 2018.
The Prime Minister has also reduced the number of members in newly constituted EAC to 13 from 19 and retained only two from the previous body. Former Governor State Bank of Pakistan Dr Ishrat Husain, Dr Ashfaq Hassan Khan, former economic adviser and Dean Nust Business School, and former Principal Economic Adviser Sakib Sherani have been excluded from the EAC.
Former SBP Governor Shahid Kardar, Dr Ali Cheema, a professor of Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS), Atif Bajwa, banking and financial sector specialist, Sima Kamil, CEO of United Bank Ltd, Sultan Ali Allana, Chairman Board of Directors of Habib Bank Ltd, Arif Habib, Fawad Anwar and Asif Riaz Tata from the corporate sector, Advocate Supreme Court Salman Akram Raja, Agricultural Policy Specialist Muhammad E Tasneem, ex-chairman PARC and ex-member Planning Commission, have reportedly been inducted by the Prime Minister in the reconstituted EAC. Former Finance Minister Shaukat Tareen will head the EAC.
Adviser to the Prime Minister on Finance and Economic Affairs Dr Miftah Ismail, PM's Adviser on Revenue Haroon Akhtar, Minister of State for Finance Rana Mohammad Afzal and SBP Governor Tariq Bajwa would be ex-officio members of the Council.
Federal secretaries of commerce, finance, industries and production, planning, national food security, revenue and textile division would also be ex-officio members of the EAC.
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