Three years of the PTI government

Barkat Ullah
The current government of Pakistan has completed three years of its tenure. Government of PTI led by prime minister Imran khan is very confidant regarding its performance. In a mega event in Islamabad, prime minister and his team uncovered the achievements and performance which they claim. On the other side opposition, as usual rejected all the claims and economic successes of PTI government and declared these fake and white lies. Blaming and criticism from both sides on one another is a normal day routine in Pakistan, due to which the common people don’t know how to get the authentic and right side of the story. Generally, performance of a government is evaluated by five parameters. These standards, legislation, institutional reforms, economic investment, projects and policies. The first three have an indirect but vital role in promoting of public interest. The last two aspects directly influence the common people but greatly proportional to the performance in the first three sectors. Here is the comparison of PTI government with these parameters.In the first three years of Imran khan administration, the national assembly bothered very little to move a legislation. Being the major party and ruling entity, it was the responsibility of PTI, to unite all the parliament in major national issues. But unfortunate for PTI and its allies in government, it is very rare that government and opposition have worked together on national issues. Unlike 18th amendment and national action plan NAP, by the previous governments, PTI government has hardly moved any significant law through parliament in these three years. On contrary, Imran and company mostly depend on presidential ordinances which is always criticized in political arena. So, over all it can be said that the performance of PTI government in legislation sector is below the normal level. Institutional reforms are another vital area, on which a ruling party should be more focused, if it wants its bright Political future or better performance in coming elections. PTI before coming in government always criticized the previous governments especially that of PMLN for politicizing institutions. There were some great expectations of public from PTI government that will bring some revolutionary reforms in institutions. But unfortunately, the current government badly struggled in bringing positive changes in institutions. Police, WAPDA, FIA and several other important departments haven’t seen any improvement yet. People are still complaining about the poor attitude of Punjab police towards public, the police departments of the largest province of Pakistan. This is one such example, there are many more according to which majority of institutions hardly saw a few reforms in these three years of PTI government. In the 21th century, globalization has got tremendous importance. In such circumstances, economic interaction among States is one of the important elements of modern-day politics. In the context of Pakistan, the current government of PTI has failed in its three years of government, to bring any major economic investment to the country. the previous government of PMLN always claim credit of bringing home major economic investment in shape of China Pakistan economic corridor CPEC, a major economic and strategic partnership between Pakistan and China. It is another debate that who should be given credit of CPEC but it is a sheer fact that the project has badly suffered due to terrorist attacks in recent months. The current government of PTI is under immense pressure of China’s authorities regarding the security of game changer project. As for as project is concerned, PTI led collocation government has contributed well in this sector. Several significant project and programs such as Health insurance, housing scheme, Kamyab jawan program are some important steps the government is taking. Similarly, the government is also very ambitious regarding tackling Environmental issues. Government has launched a plantation drive of ten billion trees in its tenure, which is really an encouraging step. The last standard of good governance is the policies of government. It is really important for the political credibility of a government to adopt public inclined policies. But as discussed earlier the first three sectors such as legislation, institutional reforms and economic investment greatly influenced the latter two. As the government performance is below the standard in the first three, so, it is very difficult for it to prove itself in the last two. Therefore, People majority of time complain regarding domestic social and economic issues such as gender and domestic violence, inflation, energy crisis, and shortage of daily stuff etc. The government needs to put their political claims aside, and start work on these five sectors in its remaining two years of power, if it wants to go with a real agenda in the upcoming elections.