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Friday March 29, 2024

People are talking about —

June 13, 2021

-- how the Senate committee chairpersons have a key responsibility to control committee business which is essential to the legislative process, but these positions have been handed out as though they were personal thank you tokens and are not based on merit. People say this business of rewarding allies with chairperson appointments has become as common a practice as that of horse-trading and vote-buying in the Senate and the lawmakers have dealt a blow to the spirit of democracy.

-- the suggestion that NAB should use its public services messages to warn people that details of everyone caught and prosecuted will be made public through its website. People say this can become a powerful tool to prevent corruption if the bureau ensures that no pressure will be entertained in making a public disclosure of all those from whom looted, embezzled or ill-gotten funds have been recovered. Hopefully, it will cause perpetual agony and fear in the hearts of those intending to engage in corruption.

-- the budget session and how the opposition made a hue and cry about it being anti-people even before its details were presented by the Finance Minister. The opinion of many persons who watched this behaviour on their television screens is that the opposition just opposes for the sake of opposition rather than focus on things that really matter and in so doing makes a fool of itself rather than convince the public it is trying to fool.

-- how the axiom ‘Birds of a feather, flock together’ is proven time and again when the opposition parties get together to rattle the government despite the fact that most of them are at loggerheads with each other since the PDM fiasco. People say PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardaris statement that his party would support Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly Shehbaz Sharif on the budget despite the inappropriate behaviour of some PML-N members, is a case in point.

-- how the success of the budget for 2021-22 hinges on the ability of the government to raise estimated tax revenues of around Rs5.83tr. The target is ambitious, given the fact that the government has let go significantly large revenues through its tax incentives and is difficult to achieve but possible, if the FBR ‘pulls up its socks’ as the saying goes and makes a concerted effort to bring the large number of tax evaders into the tax net.

-- the fact that we are still importing some items of daily use either because they are not being produced/manufactured here or their quality is not good. People say but there are many food items like jams; biscuits etc. which need to be taken off the import list as they cater only to the wealthy who have a hang up about using ‘imported’ items because in this sector the ‘Made in Pakistan’ ones are just as good if not better.

-- the shocking manner in which a surplus stock of tomatoes in Sindh was disposed of in canal water and how they could have been utilized to make preserved items if the facilities to do so were provided. People say the provincial governments should set up small factories, with proper machinery; hygienic manufacturing procedures and situated near farm lands so if there is surplus food it can be converted into preserved items for public consumption. – I.H.