Hafiz Ahsaan Ahmad hokhar
Advocate
Undoubtedly, in modern world, it is the primary and fundamental responsibility of every state and government to provide the best, trustworthy and credible system of Governance & Justice to its citizens, through which the allocation of state resources is to be distributed efficiently among the citizens on equitable resources and their rights are protected through an efficient judicial and administrative justice system. Good governance and efficient Civil, Criminal & administrative justice system has been a dream for citizens and a great challenge for the legislatures and policy-makers of Pakistan. Pakistan now needs for its bright and promising future to immediately start working on reforms for a long term based on the Charter of “Good governance” and Charter of the provision of “Instant justice” to its citizens by taking into board all the relevant stakeholders and to legislate at earliest.
One should accept this reality that both the system of governance and justice has not successfully been able to get the citizens’ trust and confidence. As a matter of fact, in the absence of good governance and failure in timely justice, Pakistan lacks far behind in planning which results in mal-practices like corruption and exploitation of resources. International and local reports continuously have revealed and alarmed on different aspects of poor governance in Pakistan but despite these obvious facts, the due and required attention at top level has not been given both on legislative and institutional building sides, resultantly day by day, the situation has deteriorated. Lack of human resource and outdated legislation along-with poor infrastructure are other main responsible areas of bad governance and inefficient justice system, which the country has been paying a heavy price for decades.
Since the inception of Pakistan, citizens have been continuously demanding for good governance and desire a mechanism for speedy justice, but despite their genuine and legitimate demands, the results reflect otherwise. Pakistan standing among the world in the social, economic, governance and delivery of justice are not appreciable but depicts a gloomy picture day by day, which is not at all in the interest and good future of Pakistan. Undoubtedly, the citizens’ consistent demands towards the state and government are genuine and legitimate, thus the state and government of Pakistan needs to be responsive to those demands.
The economic/ governance conditions and quality life of citizens in Pakistan cannot be enhanced and better improved without introduction of good and credible governance and efficient justice system. There are certain gaps of asymmetries at various levels of government (federal, provincial and local) while designing, implementing and delivering public policy, which hinder its performance and in service delivery, which should be identified and addressed immediately. This should also be concerned for the legislatures and policy makers in areas of macro and micro-economic management, political stability, improvement of public policy, public administration and institutional capacity.
The technological advancement in different types of media especially in social media has raised public expectations from the government. Now, citizens of Pakistan have access to more information, which stimulates them in judging their government’s performance on governance, policy making and justice delivery. There is a need to understand the public sentiments, demands and needs of those who will be directly affected by the policies of the government with further objectives to address and rectify the affairs of governance and public management at all levels to achieve the social, economic and development growth in the country.
There is no option for the state and government of Pakistan except to immediately take serious capacity building measures to enhance the efficiency of governance, justice delivery and human capital to meet the requirements of citizens and of modern world challenges. There is also a need to re-evaluate and redesign the role of federal, provincial and local governments and their capacities as well to govern the current situation of governance and for the effectiveness in public governance and administrative justice system in future. In the absence of good legislation and without starting working on sufficient capacity of both human and capital, it would not be possible to deliver the public on merit.
The desired results of a good governance and justice system could not be achieved without reforming the basic structure with time-bounded legislation and through a better monitoring system of external public bodies like other successful countries do. It is mandatory and important now that, if the issues of bad governance, gaps in public service delivery and obstacles in timely justice are not addressed and removed seriously by the decision makers, it will keep damaging the country in future.
It is also important for the improvement and to address such challenges, the legislatures, the government and the policy makers need to immediately start reforms in areas of governance and to legislate on administrative, civil & criminal justice sides. It is also essential to foster collaborations and to take competent people with the right skills in the government and justice system while ensuring that high quality information is available and to be used in decision-making.
Governance is analyzed as a continuum and it does not automatically improve over time. The requirements and expectations in modern good governance should be addressed as top priority such as good service, handling matters in an interactive/respectable way, openness, digitization, structured discretion, time bounded decisions, the realization of legal rights and obligations and the flexible procedures with strong internal and external oversight mechanisms. It is also important to learn and apply the best practices of the world in areas of governance and time bounded justice. Thus, with this background, there is an urgent need to establish mainstream governance and justice discipline under an institution with better solutions to deliver the public, giving them a good response and to achieve a respectable place among the community of the world in governance and justice.
