- Why a think tank when there’s a Finance Ministry?
The second meeting of the think tank constituted by Prime Minister Imran Khan to deliberate on the coronavirus-related economic downturn and mitigation of risks recommended a further cut to the policy rate, and a reduction in fuel prices. The question arises why this body was formed in the first place. Is it a quiet substitute for the Economic Advisory Council formed by this government soon after it was elected? Or is it some sort of control on the man who chairs it, PM’s Finance Adviser, Dr Hafeez Sheikh? The EAC, which got mired in controversy because of the Ahmadi faith of one of the members, was more suited to a presidential form of government than a prime ministerial, but this think tank merely formalizes something the PM’s Finance Adviser could have done anyway, which was talk to the members.
Further, its recommendations are things that the mantra of autonomy has placed outside the government’s competence. The government cannot directly reduce the policy rate. That can only be done by the State Bank of Pakistan’s Monetary Policy Committee. The MPC is usually amenable to Finance Ministry suggestions, but that means that the Finance Ministry could have simply prepared the necessary summary for the SBP, asking it to cut the policy rate. Similarly, there was no real need for any body but the Finance Ministry to suggest a fuel price cut to OGRA, which is the competent body to do so. The policy rate has been cut twice already, and fuel rates have been cut once.
One of the most common bureaucratic practices has been to hand over to a committee anything one wants no action to be taken. Unfortunately, the coronavirus pandemic will not disappear because it has had a think tank set up to deal with its economic consequences. If the government has no idea of what to do, it should not hide beyond a committee or a think tank and hope that the problem will go away by prayer. The Prime Minister should make sure that his economic team is of sufficient caliber to handle the issue, and it should take action. The think tank is part of the ‘look-busy-do-nothing’ syndrome that afflicts our government machinery and which the PTI has been unable to change.
