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 nominat