Yet it must not turn into a loot sale for favourites
The day, or is it the night, of the IMF is back to haunt us. After the dubious ‘feast’ of the doling out of a few billion dollars, mainly to pay off its maturing earlier loans and interest thereon, comes the harsh moneylender’s bill. And from the look of things it will be quite a heavy, perhaps even a back-breaking bill, this time. Within months, as a consequence of the IMF’s usual unrealistic preconditions and diktat, the rupee has broken all previous records of cringing before the dollar, the electric power rates on the other hand have hit the roof along with simultaneously raising product of petroleum prices, and all over town the talk is again of privatization. It is that season when the panacea for all the economic ills plaguing our tottering economy are being ‘read’ in this one word by our financial shamans and soothsayers.
Pakistan’s experience with this shortcut mode of raising desperately needed funds is hardly an enviable one. During the first round of privatization in the 1990s, Mian Nawaz Sharif presiding, there was much criticism of the exercise centred round the cliché that that the ‘family silver’ was being sold off. This objection, however, no longer applies at the present juncture. Thanks to the ravages of our leaders of various hues but one mindset, Nadir Shahi, the family silver has now turned into junk. The public sector enterprises (if such disasters can be termed thus) have become billions-guzzling white elephants, mired in corruption, lacking in deserving personnel of merit and swamped by hordes of political appointees. They are indeed ripe for the sacrifice of a profitable sell-off. The main objection, however, revolves round the transparency and credibility of this emergency last-ditch measure. In the 1990s, much controversy was stirred up due to the ‘loot sale’ at hugely undervalued prices of some high–profile institutions to favourites. But the die is cast. Under the IMF structural benchmarks, the government has directed the Privatisation Commission to put up the ‘for sale’ sign on 31 public sector enterprises immediately, with 65 to follow by end 2013, by divesting 26 percent shares and management control to the purchaser(s)of these bloated and unmanageable institutions. At the same time the ministry of finance issued a statement to the effect that ‘in the process the interests of the employees were to be protected at all costs’. It is clear that reorganization can only begin with massive lay-offs and forced golden handshakes, and the government’s resolve will be severely tested.
The familiar vultures and the fat cats are gathering and drooling at the prospects of a (financial) killing. But now, in the presence of a vibrant media and other societal watchdogs (not to mention the courts), any succumbing to crony capitalism and plutocratic favouritism might cost the government dear. To avoid any embarrassment or worse, transparency must not be compromised at any cost this time around.
