Slapping taxes on masses in Pakistan on the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is not a new thing. Imposing fresh taxes on the masses by making them “scapegoats” is a easy way out for the government.
In order to address the backlash, the government is saying it is cutting expenditure by about Rs200 billion a year as it struggles to comply with IMF conditions to keep the country from defaulting. One of the recently-announced measures that has gotten a lot of attention is the decision for cabinet members to lose pretty much all perks and privileges, and even their salaries. Other elected officials and bureaucrats will also lose several ‘luxurious’ perks.
Cutting perks is primarily about optics, yet the government seems to forget that the optics of a bloated 85-member cabinet are far worse. Also, not all politicians are industrialists, zamindars or waderas. Salaried individuals who give up their day jobs for public service deserve to maintain a certain standard of living.
However, it is true that such people remain in the minority, so cutting perks is mostly only applying to people for whom their government salaries are pocket change. They can surely pay their own utility bills and pay for their own air tickets if they want to fly in business or first class, or stay at luxury hotels.
It is also worth noting that many people are getting perks that they are not entitled to, yet nobody is punished for these abuses. Car privileges are the most commonly abused, even though they should be easy to spot. People taking multiple vehicles, including by availing the monetisation scheme and official cars simultaneously, can easily be caught.
Here question arises why Pakistan has to obey the IMF conditions again and again? why the rulers are not overhauling the system of the country to prevent this misery. Islamabad needs to focus on the productive measures and create concrete ways to boost income and tax collection rather than relaying on help from the friendly countries and international loans.
