Taking back health facilities

Healthcare and education have never been a priority for governments in Pakistan. To cater to the needs of more than 200 million people, there are only 1,211 public-sector hospitals, 5,508 basic health units, and 676 rural health centres. Lately, the federal and provincial governments have opted for the so-called Public Private Partnership (PPP) mode while handing over the administrative and operational control of their health and education facilities to the private sector along with budget allocations. It is happening in all the four provinces.

However, a report in this newspaper says that that the Punjab government has stopped grants to seven public-sector health care facilities which were being managed by the Indus Hospital. According to this report, the provincial government decided to do away with this arrangement due to financial constraints and will now manage and operate these facilities itself from the next financial year.

These facilities were handed over to the Indus Hospital under public-private partnership (PPP) by the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz government in its last tenure. Punjab is not alone opting for this PPP mode for the provision of basic facilities including health, education, water, power, transport, etc. This PPP mode is lately being orchestrated as panacea for all wrongs in the system of governance, especially in the social sector. It is not only an indicator of the state’s attempt to absolve itself of the constitutional responsibility to provide its citizens with these basic facilities but also an expression of government’s inability or the lack of capacity to manage these facilities fairly. There is another aspect to this love of the PPP mode and that is to oblige certain individuals or groups or NGOs by ‘gifting’ them these facilities along with the budgetary allocations.

The Punjab government’s decision to take back these facilities and to manage them itself from the next financial year could well be in accordance with the pledges the Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf had made in its manifesto.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 17^th, 2019.

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