Every year, the day comes and goes by. This year the Pakistani nation should observe Defence of Pakistan Day (Sept 6) as a day of introspection. Let us do some soul searching. Will every new baby be born in Pakistan indebted forever? Why have successive Pakistani governments failed to provide universal healthcare and education to its people? There are several points to ponder.
System of government
Pakistan is doubtless an Islamic republic, but not a theocracy, as envisioned by the founding father Mohammad Ali Jinnah. AK Brohi has in his The Fundamental Law of Pakistan highlighted the contours of a theocracy very well. Yet, in our overebullience to Islamise our economic system, we often fall on the precipice of hypocrisy.
Interest outlawed under Pakistan’s constitution
The Islamic preamble (Objectives Resolution) was inserted in draft constitution under Pakistan’s prime minister Liaquat Ali Khan’s influence. Unlike the US and many other secular constitutions, the Objectives Resolution (now Preamble to 1973 Constitution) states `sovereignty belongs to Allah Almighty’. The golden words of the constitution were warped to continue an interest-based economy. We pay interest on our international loans and international transactions. Do we live in an interactive world or in an ivory tower?
Article 38 (f) of the Constitution of Pakistan, quoted heretoforeprovides: f) eliminate riba
[economic interest as early as possible.
Follow-up to outlawed `Interest’
The Security and Exchange Commission of Pakistan enforced Shariah Governance Regulations 2018. This regulation is follow-up to Article 38 (f) of the Constitution of Pakistan, and Senate’s resolution No. 393 (July 9, 2018) for abolition of riba (usury).
(extortionist interest) and normal interest/profit are indistinguishable. They disallow even saving bank-accounts. They point out that riba is anathema both as `addition’ (taffazzul) and due to `delay'(nas’ee) consequent upon fluctuating purchasing power.
The regulation is welcome but there are unanswered questions about Islamisation of finance in Pakistan. We pay interest on our loans and international transactions.
Future trading is hub of modern commerce. Yet, it is forbidden under Islam. Islamic law of contract does not even allow advance contracts concerning raw fish, fruit, or anything involving element of `uncertainty’. Islam does not allow even tallaqi-ur-rukbaan (buying camel-loads of goods from caravan before they had reached Madina open-market.
Debt burden
Converting consumerist Pakistan into a productive economy
Let China help expand Pakistan’s manufacturing capacity and thereby reduce unemployment in Pakistan. All policymakers should act in unison. They include policy formulators (prime minister, finance minister, et. al), policy detailers (chief economic adviser, statisticians) and technocrats. The policy-makers should decide upon balance of priority. agriculture or industry, “closed” economy with import substitution, “living within means” and balanced budget or deficit budget. Will increased spending “crowd in” or “crowd out” private investment? Monetary policy objectives and the role of the central bank_ stability of employment and inflation, growth rate, balance-of-payments issues Role of foreign-direct investment and “non-bank financial institutions? Their impact on capital formation, consumption trends, and other macroeconomic aspects.
Building Kalabagh and other dams
The first priority of most countries, including USA, Russia, Brazil, and China, was to build hydel projects. China’s big-push into industrial progress was due to a chain of hydel projects like the Three Gorges, Gezhouba, Xiluodu, Xiangjiaba, Longtan, Hongshui, Nuozhadu, Jinping-I and II, Yalong, Laxiwa, Xiaowan, Goupitan, Guanyinyan, and Ahai.
The Kalabagh Dam Project was approved by the Technical Committee on Water Resources 2003-2005. It was composed of eight technical experts, two from each province. To store monsoon flows of the upper reaches of the Indus River, they approved the project. The Committee looked into all aspects including the effect of dilution of seawater with fresh water, seawater intrusion into the groundwater, riverine irrigation, and forests fisheries, besides growth of Mangrove forests. Later, the 3500 megawatts KBD was approved by World Bank Indus Special Study Group in its report titled Development of Water and Power Resources of Pakistan: A Sectoral Analysis (1967).
The estimated cost of constructing the dam was US$6.12 billion, over six years from 1977 to 1982. After commissioning of Tarbela Dam in 1976, the dam could have been built in six years by 1982. The cost per unit of 12 billion units the hydel electricity was Rs.1.5 as compared to Rs. 16.5 per unit from thermal sources. We are losing Rs. 180 billion per year due to ten times costlier production (12billion xRs.15 billion). Add to it loss of US$ 6.12 billion per annum from due to the superfluous flow of 30 million Acre Feet at of water from Kotri Barrage into the Arabian Sea (one MAF valued at US$1-1.5 billion).
Our water resources reserves have not risen pari passu with growth in population. Three provincial assemblies resolved against building the KBD. A politician alleged the dam would convert Sind into a desert. Apprehensions against the dam could be allayed by reviewing Water Apportionment Accord (as directed by Lahore High Court also vide its Order dated November 29, 2012, case no. WP 8777). No justification to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs.
Revamping healthcare
Pakistan’s healthcare system is in shambles. There is only one hospital for federal civil servants that are the Federal Government Services Hospital. Instead of establishing new hospitals. The successive civil governments allowed civilian residents of Rawalpindi and Islamabad and those who happen to have CNICs of the said cities to get free treatment at the said hospital. Because of overcrowding, the hospital has become good for nothing for civil servants. Even senior civil servants with a lifetime of service have to stink in general wards. The officers’ wards are allotted to non-civil-servants who have a way with the muckraker doctors. Recently I, a septuagenarian, with 40 years of service, was admitted in the hospital. Look at my agony. I had to avail a stinking clogged toilette with a flat seat from where I could not rise without external help. The Medical Superintendent never visited the wards even for once during my stay.
Short of funds, we should put our fragmented unbridled hospitals under one civil-military supervisory board, and distribute load reasonably. The facilities at PIMS should be improved, including increasing number of ventilators and dialysis machines.
The politically-expedient burden of residents of Rawalpindi/Islamabad on Federal Government Services Hospital should be taken off. The hospital is now good.
The ‘civilian officers, serving and retired, paid out of defence services’ should be empanelled to military (CMH/AFIC) to reduce FGSH patient load. A revolving fund may be created to entitled them for 7/24 treatment subject to payment of contributory share (say 50: 50) to a revolving fund or actual expenses payable by a patient..
No healthcare system, not even the US ‘system’, in the world is perfect. Yet, each, by and large, delivers the goods. The familiar medical system of wealthy countries is the Bismarck model (multi-payer health-insurance model), the Beveridge model, the National Health Insurance Model, the out-of-pocket model, and the US model. The government should pick up good points of medical systems of wealthy and poor countries alike. The Bismarck model is being followed in Belgium, France, Germany, Japan and Switzerland.
Generally, healthcare providers in this model are private entities. The government neither owns nor employs most physicians. Health insurance also is provided by private companies, not by the governments. Governments strictly regulate costs and other aspects of healthcare (no arbitrary fees and fleecing). The US outspends its peer nations on health. Yet it has no universal-health insurance, nor universal health coverage.
Thailand’s successful healthcare plan reflects three lessons: being prepared, exercising tight control, and being pragmatic and politically broadminded.
Thailand took opposition and other stakeholders aboard. As such, the plan remained intact despite change of governments. Thailand’s per capita income, health expenditures, and tax base is comparable to India. Yet, it achieved universal healthcare in 2002.
It spends around four per cent of its Gross Domestic Product on health. In Thailand out-of-pocket medical expense has fallen to 12 per cent, as compared to 40pc to 60pc per cent in wealthy countries. The proportion of children dying in the first five years of life fell to less than 1.2 per cent. Thailand saved money by shutting down or consolidating selected good-for-nothing lackadaisical hospitals (like ours) that had large government budgets.
Universal literacy
The little said about it, the better.
Concluding remarks
We need to do some soul searching. We could learn a lot from the planning and development experience of the Ayub era. Is it fair to devolve dam building to provinces?
Pakistan has abolished interest (riba) in accordance with its fundamental law. Yet its banking sector and international transactions are interest based.
Let Pakistan face the truth. It needs to evolve and show case a politico-economic model of Islam that is compatible with international practices. Or else, dispense with hypocritical patchwork, and go for secularist IMF model.
What is the justification of the top heavy paraphernalia of a civil government if it can’t even provide healthcare and education to its people?
