Situating constituency funding

Situating constituency funding
It is said that the absence of effective local governments creates a gap in service delivery at the grassroots
The writer is a senior political economist based in Islamabad. He can be reached at [email protected]
Going against his past protestations, the Prime Minister succumbed to constituency pressure by promising development funds of half a billion each to MNAs/MPAs. Luckily, timely court intervention has rescued him from the ignominy. Constituency funding is a means to buy political support. But the practice was not started by politicians. A rules-based mechanism exists for development budget allocation. Only projects/programmes satisfying the approval criteria are included. The practice of special programmes with block allocations for projects yet to be formed and approved started in the 1982-83 budget, with an allocation of Rs150 million. Under General Zia’s martial law, a nominated Majlis-e-Shura had come into being. Mahbubul Haq, a nominated planning minister, was finding it hard to follow his development agenda in the domineering presence of Ghulam Ishaq Khan who, as finance minister, was also the chairman of the Planning Commission. In an effort to create his own constituency, Mahbub decided to involve the Shura members in development activity. Officers of the Planning Commission were deputed to attend the Shura sessions to report on the issues of members’ interest. Meetings were held with groups of members in the light of these reports to make some need assessment and have a sense of priorities. While Mahbub was trying to pursue his development agenda, General Zia saw in this special programme an opportunity to prepare his own brand of politicians for any future political setup. Resultantly, the special programme had increased more than three-fold by 1984-85.

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