LAHORE: Civil servants are responsible for maintaining a stable, well-functioning government, and their work touches almost every aspect of people’s lives. The fact that the system is not functioning in Pakistan shows that the bureaucrats are dysfunctional.
Past governments have tried to revitalize some government departments through incentives, better pay, and technology, but if we analyze their performance, it has deteriorated over time. The Federal Board of Revenue, for instance, remains one of the most corrupt institutions in Pakistan despite substantial investments from the World Bank and other donor institutions for its upgrade.
The department also faces numerous challenges, such as the public’s declining trust in its technology and the upgrading of human resources. This is alarming as the right technology and competent human resource can take all government agencies to unprecedented heights.
Did we invest in the wrong technology? Maybe we tried to upgrade a human resource that was not prepared to upscale itself. Is it possible that the entrenched revenue officials used the newfound expertise to further streamline their rent-seeking ventures instead of increasing government revenues? Our revenue department is in a mess because we are short of resources and they are averse to the technologies which enable the government servants to do more with less.
On paper, the federal board of revenue is almost fully empowered with technology, but in practice, the software is tinkered in a way that throws filers (of the liking of revenue officials) out of the system to the manual system.
From manual handling, they could get their rents. The facilitations provided to the exporters are managed in a way that revenue officials could get a hefty amount for registering any product, input first with the FBR before qualifying for that facility.
The FBR system works on the assumption that every businessman is cheating. They place checks at every step to stop them from cheating and in the process create an opportunity for themselves to create additional avenues of rent.
The system, in fact, is rotten. Most experts have repeatedly pointed out the need to scrap the entire department of over 23000 employees as no reforms are possible in the presence of a rent-seeking culture.
The culture has developed over time and officials use their energy to defeat any reform that brings total transparency.This means raising a new revenue department. But there would be no surety that the new department would deliver in the present system.
The rulers would have to do away with their habit of arbitrarily removing or transferring the revenue officials. Each post in the revenue department should be tenure-based (ideally this should be practiced in all bureaucracy). This will bring confidence among the employees and they would not be under pressure from the ruling elite to unduly punish or condone any taxpayer for their wrongdoing.
The new workforce must be made to operate within rules and none of its officials should enjoy discretionary powers. Any deviation from rules must be duly punished. Accountability of erring officials is a must. Revenues would increase in a sustainable manner if all taxation rules are fully complied with. There would be no need to invent ways to increase revenues."