Pakistan’s economic ills are courtesy corruption, abuse of power and policies framed by its economic wizards and corrupt FBR bureaucracy.
The abundance of assets owned by bureaucrats working in FBR speaks of their integrity or lack of it. Majority of these men hold dual nationalities. Men who are either on payrolls of IMF, World Bank, ADB etc, who are either on deputation, or have retired from these organisations are only there to serve their paymasters, or bask in the glory of unlimited powers and perks enjoyed by Pakistan’s bureaucracy.
There is abundance of opportunities offered to escalate your foreign assets through kickbacks, commissions and paybacks. It has been a case of constant wrong choices of men, who neither have any stake in the country, nor are in touch with ground realities.
If any proof is required, our present economic predicament stares you in the face. From the massive printing of notes, to pilferages of over Rs 600 Billion in revenue tax receipts and wrong refunds, to the issue of thousands of missing containers; it is an epitaph for our virtually dead economy.
As for their professional integrity and ethics, the last eight years have witnessed escalation in fudging of tax revenue collection figures, a culture of issuing SRO to facilitate unethical tax rebates and refunds and being part of a system where printing of currency notes has become a norm.
The few who had a conscience and commitment to Pakistan, men like Shaukat Tareen and Shahid Kardar chose to resign, rather than be part of the systematic economic murder of Pakistan and its shattered economy.
What Pakistan desperately needs is a team of men with integrity, undivided commitment and loyalty to Pakistan and a fool-proof system of checks and balances with strict exemplary accountability for those caught in irregular practices. A country where the tax collector is the biggest tax evader has no future, nor a viable economy.
ANEELA CHANDIO
Sukkur