The idea of a welfare Islamic state, which was the base of a separate home land, is still a distant dream despite marvelous developments in various social and economic fields in the country. A monotonous routine prevails in official hierarchy, which is incompatible with the fast changing world and it calls for a dire need to introduce structural reforms in civil services, education, health, police and criminal justice for achieving the cherished goal of good governance.
Addressing the Pakistan Governance Forum 2014, Ahsan Iqbal, the minister for planning development and reforms, has stressed the need for introducing reforms in civil services structure to achieve the desired results set in Vision 2025 for good governance, economic development and social prosperity. The minister stressed the need for removing bottlenecks in the achievements of goals, which the governments had set for the national development. No doubt the structure of civil serviceis based on colonial era traditionscoupled with outdated methods of implementation which are incompatible with the modern era’srequirements. No mechanism has been evolved to judge the performance of civil servants, and it is emerging as a big hurdle in institutional development and service delivery to benefit the masses. Therefore, Iqbal points out the necessity to put the right man for the right job by devising specialized groups of professionals within the civil services cadre.
The country has been passing through the turbulent events since its inception and political stability remained a rare commodity. On another note, inconsistent policies and casual approach toward serious issues remained a major hurdle in the capacity building of the national institutions.
The country has been in the grip of terrorism for the last over three decades and the nation needs to show solidarity and unity with those who are fighting against terroristsin various troubled areas of the country. The Peshawar tragedy is a gruesome example of terrorism which is unjustifiable from any human angle. The incident calls for improvement of law and order and unity among the rank and file of political elite to achieve the goal of economic development.
It is unfortunate that ad hoc policies, implemented by various successive governments, have accumulated myriads of problems over the years,damaging the cause of good governance. As a result, a huge vacuum at the policy level has bred various challenges for the nation such as shortage of electricity, gas and water.The Vision 2015 is a highway to economic development,but the government needs people’s cooperation as it cannot do the job alone.
