Pakistan to join global Open Government Partnership forum

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has formally signed Letter of Intent to demonstrate its intention for joining global forum of Open Government Partnership (OGP) in order to ensure transparency and Federal Minister for Finance Ishaq Dar is scheduled to participate in its summit to be held from December 6 to 9, 2016 at Paris.

Pakistan has already formulated its plan in consultation with civil society to place the concept of open government initiative so this plan will be shared with the participants of the upcoming summit at Paris paving the way for getting membership of this forum.

According to Finance Ministry’s announcement made here on Saturday, the finance minister chaired a meeting to review the preparations for his visit to Paris to participate in the 4th biennial “Open Government Partnership” Global Summit to be held from 6-9 December.  Dar earlier accepted the invitation of the governments of the United Kingdom and France to join the OGP initiative. The Letter of Intent signed by the finance minister has already been sent to OGP Secretariat expressing the intention of the Government of Pakistan to join it and commitment to respect the open government principles articulated in the Open Government Declaration of the OGP. 

On the instructions of the finance minister, the Economic Affairs Division had earlier arranged the first interactive session with the members of the civil society to formulate a roadmap for open government action plan. The next meeting with the members of the civil society will be held in the month of January.

Ishaq Dar said that Pakistan’s participation in the OGP will be another step towards increased government transparency and stronger accountability leading to greater prosperity and wellbeing of the citizens.

He said that measures such as accession to the OECD Convention on Tax Matters and move to join the OGP will project a positive image of the country around the world and demonstrate Pakistan’s strong commitment to transparency, good governance and accountability. The minister directed Secretary EAD and his team to take all necessary steps that could help in reaping the maximum benefits from Pakistan’s participation in the OGP Summit.