Dawn, April 10, 2005
Bureaucracy's role in a democratic system
By Zafar Iqbal
MS Condoleezza Rice has exhorted or possibly admonished General Musharraf to hold free and fair elections in 2007. The only free and fair elections in Pakistan were in 1970 under Yahya Khan - who, incidentally, was no champion of democracy but for some reason decided to go through this process. One does not know why he refrained from managing the results of the elections but it seems that he probably did. Perhaps he was certain that no party would emerge with a majority.
What induced him to change the parity formula to one man one vote, giving a majority to East Pakistan for the foreseeable future, still remains a profound mystery. However, all subsequent elections have been managed by the executive, the worst being the 1977 elections, which were rigged and gave Mr. Bhutto's opponents a chance to mount a major agitation, possibly with support from the CIA. Mr. Bhutto himself acknowledged this by offering the Opposition a certain number of seats. Negotiations, however, broke down.
After General Ziaul Haq took power, his referendum and subsequent elections appear to have been managed by the ISI and MI. Being more circumspect, they have generated less controversy compared to the civil administration under Mr. Bhutto.
If one assumes that we are trying to become a democracy - and it is a wild assumption given our previous track record - the higher civil service should be selected on merit, be apolitical, so that it is impartial in its conduct and is respected and has enough confidence in itself to be committed to the public good. Perfection will never be achieved but there are certain prerequisites, which can make such an outcome more likely. The most important is that the government in power has to decide that it wants free and fair elections which cannot be held without a neutral administrative system. So far, all governments, after 1958, have acted otherwise.
General Jehangir Karamat, in his ill-fated speech at the Navy Staff College in October 1998, recommended a "neutral, competent and secure bureaucracy and administration at the federal and provincial levels." However, no attempt has been made by the present (military) government to do anything about improving the performance of the civil service. Their answer seems to be to infiltrate it with as many military personnel as possible. As the military is the party in power - this is just patronage. How can they be expected to be neutral? They are also not likely to be an improvement on civilians.
In the early years of Pakistan, many of the best and the brightest opted for government service. The exceptions were often the Oxbridge educated and well-connected who preferred service with multinationals, mainly because of the salary differential. Also, because the multinationals probably preferred important connections over the ability to pass exams. There were, of course, exceptions either way. With the passage of time, the salary differential between the public and private sectors increased and young men began to look for careers elsewhere, especially after the IBA at Karachi was set up.
The system was structured in parallel with the arrangements across the border, which means there were two elite groups: the so-called administrative service or civil service personnel and those of the foreign service. The other superior services performed rather limited functions and their pay and prospects were also somewhat lower. there are pros and cons of such an arrangement.
The main argument in favour was that a society prone to sycophancy, nepotism and ethnic considerations, an elite initially selected on merit was likely to perform better than a free-for-all amongst a large number of competing individuals. The downside is that the elite chosen in this manner may not be uniformly the best because people do get left behind in the examinations and selection process who may otherwise be more competent. Besides, if the elite remain a little too exclusive, there is disaffection among other employees, which leads to another set of problems.
In the Bhutto reforms of 1973, the elite nature of the two services was abolished and everyone brought at par. With regard to promotion and prospects, the political government had the right to do more or less what it pleased. Senior civil servants could be retired at will and the jurisdiction of the High Court was removed. In its place an administrative tribunal was created, for all practical purposes, under the control of the Establishment Division.
This arrangement offered complete control over all public servants. Even upright and dignified senior civil servants were reduced overnight to errand boys. This bore its bitter fruit in the elections which, in turn, resulted in extremely unpleasant consequences for Mr. Bhutto.
In view of present attitudes how is General Musharraf going to ensure free and fair elections? Possibly, he will ask the ISI and MI to do this although their experience has been exactly the opposite. The Election Commission, generally headed by an important representative of the Supreme Court, has not covered itself with glory during the last thirty years. How do we get a strong and independent Election Commission?
To add to the complications, the present arrangement of devolution will further muddy the election process as the nazims will do their best to support their political affiliates. To say that the nazims are elected on a non-party basis and, therefore, have no party political affiliations, is a delusion. In today's political dispensation the number of independents have declined and will probably continue to do so.
Something could have been saved from the wreckage if a competent and upright management had been put in place. Unfortunately, the NRB seems to have had a deep dislike for the deputy commissioner; one doesn't know whether it was motivated by ideology or because of some unpleasant personal indignity suffered at the hands of one or more pompous DCs.
Given the process through which people succeeded in the CSS exam, this could easily happen. The successful candidates were usually the bright boys who, after passing out, were more often than not offered teaching jobs i their colleges or universities. They continued to lead a sheltered life. When inducted into the service, they had had no contact with the real world.
The entrants into the CSP felt that they had achieved nirvana. They probably thought they already knew everything and there was nothing left to learn. The greatest achievement in life was to become a DC/DM. This was incidentally not true of the British ICS where a long serving district officer was derisively called a "clodhopping collector" - dull, diligent, dedicated, unimaginative, distant and pompous towards natives, as required by imperial policy.
The Pakistan CSP officer tended to model himself on the same lines forgetting the fact that he was also a native. It was the result of a serious lapse in the training process. We were taught criminal law, civil law, revenue law, the Evidence Act, etc. But there was no discussion of how the framework within which the civil service operated after independence had changed.
We were no longer merely servants of the government but employees of that abstraction known as the state which was sovereign and was supposed to be democratic. I came face to face with this problem when I took over my first subdivision. My predecessor had left a confidential note for me.
Amongst other things it had a section on prominent citizens. They were divided into three categories: (i) unreliable, (ii) to be used with caution and (iii) reliable. I was mystified by this classification. Since one wasn't supposed to have any political affiliation, what were citizens supposed to be used for? However, it didn't take longer me to realize where such thoughts had originated. It was how to deal with the "natives." It was what a British officer would do when passing on the baton of rule to his successor.
I have mentioned the CSP because they and the DMG were the people who came most in contact with the public. Members of other services have rather more limited and specific operations - but in their own way they are not necessarily any better in their attitudes.
However, whatever their shortcomings, the summary elimination of the DC is likely to result in worse governance. Of course, some adjustments would have been necessary in view of the new local government set-up. Given our social conditions, it was belatedly realized that law and order could not be handed over to the nazims. As a result, the police have been given complete independence. Since police brutality is practically an international phenomenon, various toothless committees to look into complaints against the police have been formed to take care of their excesses. The DC being the man on the spot generally had a restraining influence.
Free and fair elections are not possible without a neutral administrative infrastructure. The system can be put on the path of improvement without major changes. It is the intent which will be decisive. The critical issues as General Karamat pointed out, are security, competence and (political) neutrality. These are determined by conditions of service, including financial and non-financial incentives, together with selection procedures for entrance and promotion. They have to be substantially independent of political influence, which the Indians appear to have achieved, but which we obviously do not like.
The writer is director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, US.
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