Culture of accountability

The one that we lack

Rubble of the Bhoja plane that crashed is still being sifted through. Rescue workers and security personnel, along with family and friends of the deceased are combing the wreckage for some clue or cause of the accident, or some memory of loved ones. Aviation experts, eyewitnesses from the locality, and governmental agencies are giving their (different) speculative versions of what might have happened to cause the crash. Regardless of which version is accurate, it is clear that someone – either the pilot, or those who commissioned an obsolete plane into service, or the aviation authorities guiding the aircraft through bad weather – was at fault for the accident. But despite statements from government officials and private experts, no one has come forth to be accountable.

Change of scene: armed militants stormed the jail in Bannu, and freed several hundred convicts (including militants convicted for terrorism and murder), while the jail officials, intelligence securities and police personnel stood impotent. No fight or resistance was put up from any quarter. This security lapse, resulting in the freeing of militants, has endangered people’s lives and amounts to a crime against the public. And the only response from the government has been to ‘transfer’ some mid-level police officials. No one, from the higher echelons of police and administrative authority, has stepped forth to be accountable for the security failure.

Accountability, it seems, is an idea missing from our cultural philosophy.

Let’s bifurcate this further. From a schematic perspective, accountability in our administrative and public domain, exists at three institutional levels. One, each governmental department has some process of internal accountability of its activities and personnel (for example, a complaint can be made against one employee to his or her superior). Two, independent agencies exist with the sole mandate of investigating and holding accountable those who may have abused or not fulfilled their responsibilities (for example the Federal Investigation Agency and the National Accountability Bureau). Three, judicial review of public authority or, for that matter, judicial determination of public disputes serves as a final layer of accountability.

These three tiers of accountability, while having their own deficiencies, add up to a reasonably well-functioning apparatus. And most of the developed nations, where the accountability process is effective and transparent, employ a similar tiered system. What then, it must be asked, is the reason for such abhorrent standard of accountability in Pakistan?

The answer, unfortunately, is not a legal or systematic one. The reason is that Pakistan simply lacks a culture of accountability, especially among those who are in positions of power.

Just a few days back, Bangladesh’s railways minister resigned from his post in the cabinet on allegation (not conviction) of corruption. In his statement, Mr Suranjit Sengupta was quoted as saying that his reason for resignation was “to allow an impartial investigation” into the matter. In Pakistan, on the other hand, Railways has come to a virtual standstill, PIA is barely functional, and national institutions such as the Steel Mill are facing bankruptcy, but no individual who is in-charge of these institutions has stepped forth to be held accountable. And while the superior courts and investigative agencies may continue to pursue these causes, the underlying problem remains: we are a not a culture of accountability.

This spirit seeps through our entire democratic machinery. Until prosecuted and publicly embarrassed, no one seems interested in taking a higher responsibility for the work done under their supervision. The Bannu prison break did not result in the top cadre of police and jail officials tendering their resignations. Some were ‘transferred’, in a face-saving exercise, only to be re-posted at some other place of responsibility. The plane-crash of 2010, despite discovery of its black-box, has had no person or institution held accountable. The death of patients from poisonous medicines at the Punjab Institute of Cardiology did not result in the concerned secretary and (chief) minister owning responsibility for lack of procedural checks in the pharmaceutical industry. DG Rangers Karachi, after the killing of an innocent boy by personnel under his command, did not step forth to be held accountable (and was later promoted to Lt General and given the command of V Corps). The intelligence chiefs, despite all hue and cry in local and international media (as well as the establishment of Abbottabad Commission under orders of the Supreme Court) were not shamed into resigning their posts after the ‘discovery’ and killing of Osama Bin Laden.

This is an issue of culture and conscience. And as such, it cannot be fully corrected through the accountability machinery that has been put in place. The point of having systematic accountability checks – at all levels – is only to discover who should be held accountable, when it is not already clear from the public facts. Ideally, such machinery should be used only sparingly and in extenuating circumstances. And for the most part, those in positions of responsibility should hold themselves accountable before the law does.

For our democratic society to fulfill its promise, accountability must be an inherent virtue of power, not an enforced responsibility. And no systematic check can make all exercise of power accountable. This can only be resolved once a culture of accountability, among those who are in positions of influence, is established without a gun to their head.

The writer is a lawyer based in Lahore. He has a Masters in Constitutional Law from Harvard Law School. He can be reached at: [email protected]