Poor parenting and national looting
Dr Mahjabeen Islam
As far as looting goes, we either saw our parents do it or did not listen to them when they tried to teach us good moral values. The plunder of Pakistan’s exchequer falls under the same premise — familial looting or personal failure
Reeling from the massive violence across Britain, PM David Cameron blamed pockets of society that had not only broken down but were “sick” and that “poor parenting” was responsible for the looting.
His diagnosis is painfully accurate; unfortunately the treatment cannot be surgically swift. For children are products of circumstance and training both in turn heavily dependent on economics and religion. And parents today are faced with infinitely greater challenges than their parents and grandparents were.
It was entirely liberating to realise that I was not the only one who grew up with visual discipline; robot-like I lived in fear of imploding as I followed the eye-bulging, frowning, or eyebrow-raising of my mother. Essentially, all of my generation has been on cruise control! And all my cohorts agree that this visual discipline is now an act of the past.
With parental commands or requests ours was a culture of ‘yes’. In families of today a parental request cannot be simple; it must be rationalised and negotiated and the response is also not simple but a debate. And somewhere along the way the hierarchy in the family unit has been lost.
For reasons unclear to me, the youth of today has tilted the balance of power in its favour, and bewildered parents struggle with varying grades of rebellion. How are robots supposed to deal with temper tantrums? Or with children demanding apologies from parents, or threatening to call the authorities with tales of abuse?
The Ten Commandments urge believers to “honour thy parents”.
In Islam, disobedience to parents falls in the category of a major sin, just under shirk (associating anyone with God) and akin to murder and adultery.
The family is the basic structural unit of society and its cohesion and well-being is vital to society’s benefit at large. The violence in Britain has strong economic reasons as well: the deprivation of a particular segment of society has simmered for a long time and has now reached an explosive point.
The video footage of the looting really does tell the story of societal breakdown. One sees an injured youth bleeding profusely and two other young men coming to his aid. And as they purportedly help him, they steal his wallet and other items from his backpack. Endless stories of shops emptied out and videos of gleeful youth parading the loot are shocking.
While poverty can be a game-changer, we are generally ambassadors of our families. And as far as looting goes, we either saw our parents do it or did not listen to them when they tried to teach us good moral values. The plunder of Pakistan’s exchequer falls under the same premise — familial looting or personal failure.
Various methods are used to teach integrity and I remember a heartwarming story as a child that was repeated on many an occasion. Shaikh Abdul Qadir Jilani was leaving home and was given a vest lined with gold coins by his mother with the express advice to tell the truth under any and all circumstance. Sure enough he was held up by robbers and when asked about money duly reported the gold coins. Shocked by his candour the robbers spared his life and his coins.
Preserving the family unit and imbuing good moral values is heavily dependent on creation and maintenance of the hierarchy within the family. While Islam promotes shoora (consultation), democracy is a great idea and discussion is vital to the healthy resolution of issues; parents must be treated as parents and not buddies or worse, servants.
Whatever the packaging the bond of love between parents, especially mothers, and children cannot be negated. God takes the name Al-Rahman (The Beneficent) from rahm or the mother’s womb, underscoring the love that a mother feels so naturally for her child. There is a slow but steady erosion of this premise among Muslim families, especially when points of contention or issues of discipline arise. The growing tendency to tie actions or history to this love makes discipline problematic. For all the parent is trying to practice is the concept of ‘tough love’ to institute sanity in chaos.
And where one wonders is the kind of love that Owais Qarni, one of the Prophet’s companion’s, felt for his mother? She asked him for water but by the time he got it she fell asleep; he stood by her bedside all night in case she awoke looking for it again. His treatment is the ultimate; the Quran recommends the basic in Al Isra (17:23) “Your Lord has decreed good treatment to parents, whether one or both of them reach old age with you, say not to them any word of contempt or repel them and address them in kind words.”
Society cannot count on the chance that parents and children will get along. The larger onus, at least in Muslim societies, lies with children and understanding the distinct orders laid down in Islam. Regardless of the age of parents or the child, irrespective of the education of the parents, mindless of the wealth of the parents or the lack thereof, at the end of every issue parents enjoy a higher stature and must be obeyed.
The Imam of my mosque said it well: included in sabr-fi-ta’a (patience in religious practice) is patience with parents and remembering that after worshipping God is the treatment of parents.
If we want to avoid societal failure as seen in London then the current trend of contempt toward and equality with parents must stop and change to a culture of cohesion, an attitude of yes and a posture of humility.
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Comments on Working Paper Against Corruption in India
The country has witnessed enormous increase in the incidence of corruption in recent times, with one major scam after another tumbling out of different cupboards. The government of the day has cut a somewhat sorry figure, both inside as well as outside Parliament, in dealing with the menace.
It remained inactive for long and when it did take action, it was rather too little, besides being too late.
The two most important anti corruption agencies that exist at the central level are the Central Vigilance Commission and the Central Bureau of Investigation.
A working paper focusing on the growth of these two central agencies has been repared. The paper written by Shri G. P. Joshi discusses some important issues relating to the working of the CVC and CBI.
Any comments that you may like to make on any point raised in this paper would be highly welcome.
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Pakistan the 34th most corrupt Country
LFP has deplored Pakistan's down-gradation on the corruption ladder and the failure of the present government to take corrective and remedial measures to bring about greater transparency. The country may not be perfor
ming well in several fields but it has moved up the corruption ladder, from the 42nd rung in 2009 to 34th in 2010.
According to Transparency International`s report for 2010, Pakistan is more corrupt today than it was last year.On a list of 178 countries Pakistan fared worse than Bangladesh and India.
The perception of the most corrupt government was in 1996 when Pakistan had achieved the second position.
Billions of rupees were siphoned off through corruption which seriously affected the country`s progress.
The report showed that nearly three-fourth of the 178 countries had scored below five on a scale from 0 (perceived to be highly corrupt) to 10, indicating a serious corruption problem.
The country perceived to be most corrupt was Somalia with a score of 1.1, followed by Afghanistan and Myanmar with 1.4.
Denmark, Singapore and New Zealand were perceived to be the most honest countries with a score of 9.3.
Bangladesh was perceived to be the most corrupt country in 2001, 2002 and 2003, but it took corrective measures and this year it was placed at number 39. Owing to decrease in corruption, Bangladesh`s GDP grew by five per cent, compared to Pakistan`s 2.4 per cent last year.
Over the past two years there had been unprecedented cases of corruption involving tens of billions of rupees in public sector organisations which should have been taken up by the National Accountability Bureau.
The government lacked the political will to fight corruption because of which the Supreme Court had to take suo motu action against organisations like the National Insurance Corporation, Pakistan Steel and rental power plants.
A delay in setting up an independent accountability commission by parliament might aggravate the situation.
The direct impact of increased corruption was witnessed in the shape of up to 120 per cent rise in food prices within a year — sugar from Rs54 a kg to Rs80, pulses from Rs50 a kg to Rs110, eggs from Rs35 a dozen to Rs60, etc.
The perception of corruption had caused a drop in foreign direct investment to $2.21 billion during 2009-10 from $371 billion the previous year. The foreign debt increased from $40 billion in 1999 to $46 billion in 2008 and $53 billion this year.
An across-the-board application of the rule of law, merit-based appointments and easy access to justice were the only solutions to the problem of corruption which was responsible for poverty, inflation, terrorism, illiteracy, lack of electricity and hoarding of essential food commodities.
He said the Supreme Court in its order in the NIC case had considered violation of public procurement rules as a criminal act and a federal crime and this would help reduce corruption.
The results again showed that corruption was a global problem that must be addressed through global policy reforms.
It was commendable that the Group of 20 in pursuing financial reforms had made strong commitments to transparency and integrity ahead of its November summit in Seoul, but the process must be accelerated.
The G20 must mandate greater government oversight and public transparency in all measures they took to reduce systematic risks and opportunities for corruption and fraud in the public as well as in the private sector.
Comparing the level of corruption perception in the region, the report said that Pakistan held the position of the second most corrupt country in 1996 and now it had improved to be placed at the 34th number, while India had improved from 9th to 91st position and Bangladesh from 4th to 43rd position during the period.
Say No to Corruption
Corruption hurts everyone. It deepens poverty. It distorts social and economic development, erodes the provision of essential public services and undermines democracy. Instead of fair competition based on price, quality and innovation, corruption leads to competitive bribery. This harms trade and deters new investment.
Corruption is a universal challenge. No country is free from it. Cultural gift-giving traditions vary widely, but there is no country where the people consider it right for public officials to abuse their positions for private gain.
Corruption is the abuse of public office for private gain. It means that:
- Decisions are taken not for the public benefit but to serve private interests;
- High-cost, overly complex and prestigious projects are favored over cost-efficient development projects making use of the most relevant technology;
- A private levy is imposed on public investment which may rise to as much as thirty percent of the cost of the project. Such inflated costs often add to the national debt;
- The environment is threatened. When environmental protection agencies are corrupt the very foundations of sustainable human development are eroded;
- Human rights abuse flourishes. As corruption increases, regimes become more secretive, less tolerant of dissent and more fearful of the loss of power. Basic social and economic rights like access to medical care, education, adequate shelter and good water are threatened.
LFP stands for liberal values and democratic norms in the society striving to ensure basic liberties; and political, social and economic rights of the people.
Liberalism is not possible without opposing corruption which hurts the weakest members of society who have to bear the full consequences of corruption when they are denied such necessities as basic health care, education and access to justice.
Corruption, by definition, is exclusive: it promotes the interests of the few over the many. We must fight it wherever we find it. Combating corruption sustainably is only possible with the involvement of all the stakeholders which include the State, civil society and the private sector. History proves that government cannot tackle corruption effectively on its own, other than in highly authoritarian and potentially abusive ways.
LFP proposes to bring together people of integrity to work for systemic reforms at the national level. We do not propose to "defame" or attack individuals, but focus on building systems that combat corruption.
There is a need to focus on building an awareness that simply strengthening prosecution and judicial powers cannot by itself curtail corruption. The whole national integrity system needs to be viewed holistically.
LFP feels that the citizens should actively attempt to develop new and original national anti-corruption strategies and monitor national developments. We all can do this by lobbying our governments, by informing the media and bringing together people concerned about corruption in Pakistan.
The strategies may include, for example:
- Transparency and accountability in government procurement and other decision-making;
- An effective auditor general and ombudsperson;
- A free media and access to official information;
- A responsible business sector;
- An independent judiciary, investigators and prosecutors;
- An elected legislature with power to hold public officials accountable.
Building Islands of Integrity
Bribery and extortion often thrive in public sector procurement of goods and services. There is a need to develop islands of integrity which should be designed to safeguard public procurement from corruption. At its core, this is a binding agreement between all bidders for a project and the procurement agency. This integrity pact can enable companies to abstain from bribing by ensuring that their competitors will not be given a competitive advantage and that government procurement agencies introduce agreed measure to safeguard the bidding process and follow transparent procedures. The integrity pact could be backed by strict sanctions.
LFP believes that the movement against corruption must transcend social, political, economic and cultural systems. Attempts to expose or investigate individual cases of corruption would not solve the problem; this should be the proper role of law enforcement agencies, an independent judiciary and a free press. LFP proposes to place greater emphasis on prevention and on reforming systems. It is not sufficient to attempt to legislate people into honesty. We should serve as catalysts for national-level initiatives which are designed by local people and appropriate to their needs and circumstances.
Liberal Forum Pakistan
LFP stands for the promotion in Pakistan of liberal values and principles, and for freedom, responsibility, tolerance, social justice, equality of opportunity, rule of law, pluralism, supremacy of democratic norms, advancing free market economy, devolution of power and decision making, and decentralization.
Liberalism is not possible in the midst of corruption. LFP believes in complete transparency in all its own transactions and desires to maintain transparency of principles and procedures with regard to its own donor-related activities. It expects the same from the Government and all other political institutions. LFP accordingly expects all its supporters to oppose corruption from every possible platform.
LFP needs a group of devoted liberals even if the number is small. It desires commitment and quality rather than quantity. It expects these committed members to give LFP something that they have. We all should feel the difference in this regard!
The key words for preventing corruption are:
- Creating awarenes
- Deconcentrating power and promoting counter-power
- Reducing opportunities for corruption
- Guaranteeing acceptable incomes promoting moral integrity
- Establishing transparency and maintaining supervision
Everyone can make an impact on curbing corruption.
- By becoming actively involved
- By contributing his or her time
- By suggesting changes to improve the system
Mansehra Corruption
In Mansehra, ulema, lawyers, traders, transporters and other segments of the society have launched a movement to work for eliminating corruption and social evils and maintenance of law and order in the district.
“Lawmakers have forgotten their duties to address the core issue of law and order and eradicate corruption. We will come out with iron hands and ensure that officials involved in corruption are taken to task, and change police culture that is the reason behind lawlessness,” said a statement issued at the end of a meeting here on July 5, 2010.
The meeting, attended by ulema, lawyers, traders, transporters, journalists and government employees, decided to launch “Tehrik Islah-i-Moashra” in which “people with modest and honest background” would be inducted.
Maulana Waqarul Haq Usman, prayer leader of the city’s central mosque, was selected as patron-in-chief; Shahjahan Khan Swati, president of the District Bar Association, as chairman; and Shujahat Ali Khan as acting secretary general.
“People who would be associated with the movement would take oath on Quran that they would not indulge in personnel vendetta or get benefits at this platform and that they would work to serve the humanity without discrimination of caste, creed and affiliation,” said one of the participants.
It was also decided that individual issues would not be considered. “Action will be taken only on collective and social issues.
Unscrupulous individuals and companies can no longer hide their untaxed Swiss bank accounts. Succumbing to international pressure, Switzerland has recently ended its 300-year banking secrecy. Like Liechtenstein, Luxembourg and Andorra, Switzerland has now agreed to share information regarding bank accounts on request from foreign governments.
Pakistani tax authorities — knowing that there exists a treaty of avoidance of double taxation and exchange of tax information with the Swiss government – have to yet taken any step to probe into hidden Swiss accounts of Pakistanis.
The Swiss House of Representatives following the Senate on June 9, 2010 accepted the demands of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) that it would follow Article 26 of the OECD’s Model Tax Convention, which countries agree to share relevant data in cases of suspected tax fraud. In practical terms, Switzerland from now on cannot restrict its administrative assistance to cases of presumed tax fraud (which involves the falsification of documents). It is legally bound to provide information where tax evasion is suspected — in other words, where money not declared to national tax authorities, has been deposited in a Swiss bank.
It is no secret that Pakistani tax evaders have been transferring huge amounts of money to Swiss banks — generated through illegal activities by some politicians, bureaucrats, terrorist networks and businessmen. Pakistan is facing the challenge of measuring and countering enormous revenue leakages and black money — its size estimated to be three time the regular economy.
Till today, no effort appears to have been made by NAB, Federal Board of Revenue (FBR), FIA, Anti Narcotics Force (AFN) or Narcotics Control Board to conduct an in-depth study to quantify the magnitude of black money and amounts shifted to Swiss banks.
According to an estimate, it is not less than 200 billion dollars — four times the external debt of Pakistan.The process started when US Department of Justice (DOJ) took the Swiss bank UBS to court to obtain the names of 52,000 clients of the bank: US citizens who, the US government claimed, did not declare to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) all details of their financial information. NAB and/or FBR have learnt no lessons from this move by the US authorities.
“At a time when millions of Americans are losing their jobs, their homes and their health care, it is appalling that more than 50,000 of the wealthiest among us have actively sought to evade their civic and legal duty to pay taxes,” says John DiCicco, acting Assistant Attorney general for the DOJ’s tax division. In the wake of US success, the European Union also announced its intention to seek a similar agreement with Swiss banks, to release the names of clients who are citizens of EU countries.
According to an estimate, the money lying in Swiss banks of Pakistanis is to the tune of US $200 billion which appears plausible as parallel economy is growing at an alarming rate of 20 percent per annum. The volume of black money generated in the year 2008-09 alone was not less than US$40bn. This is still not final. It does not account for kickbacks in foreign trade, smuggling and foreign exchange racketeering, apart from trade in narcotics and other criminal activities by terrorist outfits. According to various studies, the underground money generated through smuggling in goods and narcotics trade alone is between US $50 billion.
Policymakers must realise that a sound development strategy seeks to reduce the size of the informal economy and bring into the open resources that lie in the form of black money. Apart from such mechanisms as foreign exchange and tax amnesties, taxation is used as a tool to tap the resources inherent in these areas. According to a conservative estimate, tax evaders in Pakistan annually deprive the country of revenue of over US $10 billion — but the government, instead of putting them behind bars, encourages their unlawful activities.
Politicians, policymakers and tax managers during the last many years have miserably failed to tap untaxed money despite borrowing a whopping US$ 100m for Tax Administration Reforms Programme (TARP) — every year billions of rupees are transferred from Pakistan to Zurich, Dubai, Johannesburg and elsewhere.
It is not possible to determine the precise amount of revenue loss and size of black money or shifting of money abroad. Revenue loss on account of smuggling of Afghan transit trade alone, as estimated by the World Bank, amounted to US$ 35 billion from 2001 to 2009. Apart from direct monetary costs of corruption, both Pakistani and international literature pinpoint many other costs, such as loss of government credibility, spread of injustice, distortions in resource allocations and loss of foreign and local investment.
When the presence of black money is so apparent, its criminal accumulation and generation are not revealed and the offenders punished, is a question which continues to baffle honest citizens.
The ugliest face of black money emerges in the corridors of power, political as well as administrative. Pakistan is passing through the worst financial crisis of its history, i.e., the crisis of resources manifested in the huge budgetary deficits. Revenue has to be collected and all measures both stringent and persuasive have to be taken in that direction. The government, therefore, needs to introduce asset-seizure legislation to confiscate the mammoth reservoir of the untaxed black money — huge chunk of which is lying in the Swiss banks. It is now time to seek information from Swiss government as has been done by the US, EU countries, and many other countries in Asia and Africa.
By Naeem Sadiq
"When I send my child to the market with Rs10 to buy something, I demand an account of the money when he returns home. Similarly, when the government spends my money, I have the right to ask for an accounting of these expenditures." — Susheela Devi
A GHOST project is like a ghost school. It consumes money and resources, benefits a small group of delinquents and does nothing for its intended beneficiaries. With 30,000 ghost schools already under its belt, Pakistan is now well on its way to achieving the next milestone — to be a market leader in ghost projects.
The daily newspapers carry sickening doses of how the rich and powerful scrape away the last pennies from projects created ostensibly for the good of the ordinary people. The billion-dollar poverty alleviation program only alleviated the poverty of bureaucrats and consultants. The $350m 'Access to justice' ADB loan did not make our justice system any better. A scam of Rs3.6bn was discovered in the execution of Tawana Pakistan Project (TPP).
The former PM Shaukat Aziz spent over Rs1bn on 47 foreign visits during 2004-07. The Rs16bn clean drinking water project is bogged down by delays and complaints of unfair bidding.The KPT's purchase and subsequent theft of a Rs320m water fountain remains unchallenged. The details of payment for the two chartered aeroplanes carrying 240 freeloaders to Saudi Arabia still remain unexplained. Irresponsible expenditure coupled with heavy leakages have left the country reeling under a formidable foreign debt of $45.6bn (not counting the latest $7.6bn IMF loan). Clearly the problem of Pakistan is not the size of its kitty, but the holes in the kitty.
The numerous watchdog committees like the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), the Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (PPRA), the audit department, NAB, and the NACS have not only failed to curb this menace. They have themselves become a huge burden on the exchequer. These bodies primarily operate in a reactive manner, often moving into action long after the curtains have been dropped and the actors gone home.
There is little that these organisations can show in terms of their contribution towards accountability, especially for those who yield power or influence. On the contrary there are examples of the NAB dropping corruption cases involving Rs500bn of the taxpayers' money under the influence of the NRO.
How do other countries make their financial systems more accountable and transparent? The best method is a proactive disclosure of financial information by each department and agency. By making this information readily available on departmental websites, ordinary citizens can directly evaluate if public funds are being managed effectively. If not, they can hold the government officials accountable for their actions. The second method is the use of the Access to Information Act (at present in the process of being revised), which enables citizens to obtain any non-classified public information for scrutiny and questioning.
The Canadian government offers one of the best models for financial monitoring and accountability. It requires each department to make quarterly disclosures on its website showing: (i) details of the travel and hospitality expenses of ministers, parliamentary secretaries, political staff, and senior public service employees; (ii) details of contracts awarded; and (iii) grants and contributions that were given to any individual or organisation (http://www.tbs-sct.gc.ca/pd-dp/gr-rg/index-eng.asp). The system further provides protection for any one who exposes misuse of public funds, mismanagement or a breach of a code of conduct. The Canadian system makes it obligatory for the head of the department to disclose the identity of the person found to have committed the wrongdoing, any corrective action taken or the reasons why no corrective action was taken.
At the project level, Sri Lanka has developed an excellent web-based project monitoring system that displays monthly updated information about all foreign- and local-funded projects. The system has 12 modules which include project profile, monthly financial report, activity monitoring report, cash flow report, reimbursable foreign aid, loan covenant, procurement monitoring, financial progress on each component, project review report and comments by the public (http://www.fabm.gov.lk/index.html).
Despite the existence of an Electronic Government Directorate (EGD), the government seems to have little understanding of what is meant by the term 'e-governance'. A recent Planning Commission advertisement (Nov 22, 2008) claims that its website now contains an "interim report on economic stabilisation with a human face, speeches of the prime minister, projects identified for foreign assistance, and a 'Synoptic View' of the Planning Commission".
The government departments seem to consider their websites as instruments of self-publicity (pictures of ministers, comments, speeches and notifications) rather than putting hard facts and figures about each project, its cost, purchases, suppliers, contractors, completion dates, overruns and various other details of expenses. A good example of the data that may be included for any project monitoring may be seen at www.good-governance.com.pk , a sample website set up by a private Pakistani citizen at a modest cost of Rs7,000.
The people of Pakistan have a right to demand an end to this unending financial plunder. They have a right to demand an account of how and where their money is spent. Using Public Document Rules, 2004 the government could immediately ask every department to proactively (on its website) provide complete and ongoing details of its projects. This should be a precondition for the release of any further funds. Transparent projects and an independent judiciary may be the two key factors that could rid us of ghost projects and help us move towards a progressive Pakistan.
