This Is Why Every Pakistani Should Be Aware About The On-Going Drama Over The Public Accounts Committee!

Let’s take a break from everything else today and focus on an issue that has virtually made the Parliament of Pakistan non-functional and yet very few Pakistanis seem to be aware of this problem!

You see, for the last three months, since the formation of the new Parliament, the legislative process in Pakistan – or simply put, lawmaking – has remained at a standstill. Now, of course this stagnancy is not because of the fact that Pakistan does not need new laws. This stagnancy is actually attributed to a deadlock between the government and the opposition parties over the chairmanship of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC).

What is the Public Accounts Committee?

The Public Accounts Committee is one of the most powerful statuary organs of the National Assembly, entrusted with the task of ensuring accountability and transparency with regard to the use of public money.

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The primary function of the Public Accounts Committee is to examine the Auditor General’s reports for the relevant ministries, divisions, corporations and other independent and semi-autonomous entities.

Alright…So, What’s the Issue?

 Glad you asked!

You see, as per parliamentary traditions, PAC has been chaired by the leader of the opposition. The wisdom behind giving PAC’s chairmanship to the opposition is to help ensure greater accountability vis-a-vis public spending. Again, in simpler words this means that with the Chairman belonging to the opposition, there is a watchdog of sorts over the government to discourage misappropriation – read “corruption – of public funds.

The issue, however is that the PTI-led government has expressed its intention to break the tradition and keep the chairmanship of the Public Accounts Committee for itself.

Not very surprisingly, the opposition has not taken this “expression of intent” very politely and has threatened to boycott all parliamentary committees if the government does not allow opposition leader, Shehbaz Sharif to head PAC.

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Prime Minister Imran Khan has made it sufficiently clear, time and time again that PAC will not be handed over to Sharif. On the other hand, PTI government did offer PAC chairmanship to Bilawal Bhutto Zardari but he refused it on the pretext that it would break a parliamentary tradition that had been created while the Charter of Democracy was signed during the PPP rule in 2006.

In the wake of this deadlock – which, by the way has been going on for the last 3 months now – Speaker of the National Assembly, Asad Qaiser has stopped the process of the formation of all the remaining parliamentary committees.

And Why Must Common Pakistanis Care?

Standing Committees are considered the backbone of the lawmaking process. Debates and recommendations regarding policy and legislative changes are often first discussed among the members of the specific standing committees before they are brought to the attention of the Parliament as a whole. In short, for any new laws or policies to be passed, it is absolutely imperative for the standing committees to become functional.

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Since August 13, five sessions of the National Assembly have so far been convened. However, since no breakthrough has been achieved with regard to the chairmanship of PAC, none of the other committees have been formed either. This has reduced the Parliament’s efficacy to futile debates that are often aimed at taking un-parliamentary digs at political rivals.

And while the rich and powerful continue to spend from the taxpayer’s money to convene pointless sessions of the National Assembly – all the while engaged in a tug-of-war over the control of the Public Accounts Committee – average Pakistanis like you and I await for the Parliament to do the job that we voted it to perform, i.e. MAKE LAWS TO PROTECT OUR INTERESTS!

This complete disregard for our interest demands that Pakistanis begin actively demanding the formation of the standing committees at the earliest because in their absence there is really no hope for any groundbreaking law or policy that would, for instance, protect children, women and Pakistanis in general to passed anytime soon. 

So take to your keyboards fellow countrymen and women, tag parliamentarians and demand that the standing committees be formed ALREADY!