PM signs two-year performance agreements for remaining term

ISLAMABAD:

Terming good governance key to the success of a government, Prime Minister Imran Khan on Wednesday urged his cabinet to stay focused on achieving the targets and make the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf party stronger through service delivery.

"We are ensuring that during our tenure, all the promises are met and all services delivered to the citizens," the prime minister said while addressing the members of his cabinet at the signing of two-year performance agreements 2021-23.

The signing was part of the prime minister’s crucial civil service reforms agenda under which the government had initiated a management system that brought together all the components of the federal government through a single implementation tool of “performance agreements”.

Speaking on the occasion, the premier said only the performance delivery in the next two years will ensure the government succeeds in securing another five-year term in the 2023 general elections.

“I want our party to achieve a standard where an MP wins not on the basis of disbursement of development funds, but on the performance of his government,” he said.

While expressing confidence in their performance, the prime minister asked the ministers to achieve the goals by setting high aspirations and keep evaluating the highs and lows of their work.

He noted his government effectively tackled the simultaneous challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic and its consequences for the economy.

'Biggest challenge'

However, he added that the “biggest challenge” was the persistent fight with the “mafias” that wanted to sustain the status quo for their vested interests.

“Now the mafia has started opposing the use of EVMs [Electronic Voting Machines] in the elections because it is the beneficiary of the incumbent system through the use of money and influence,” he said.

After the 1970 elections, every poll in the country was regarded as controversial but, still, nobody wanted to resolve the root cause of the problem.

Adviser to the prime minister on the establishment, Shehzad Arbab, said 41 ministries had proposed 1,100 projects for the next two years. Of these, 426 will be completed by June 2022 and 488 by June 2023. While the remaining 176 that are already in progress will supplement the overall delivery of those ministries until the elections and beyond.

He said the agreements had been finalised after a rigorous process of review and evaluation.
Arbab said the exercise not only allowed the government to implement its agenda more effectively but also helped the ministers and their secretaries to track progress within their divisions and objectively assess the performance of their staffers.

Under the agreements, all ministries have prepared work plans with a set of initiatives and quarterly targets to be achieved by 2023.

These plans have been reviewed by a Peer Review Committee — comprising senior officials of cross-sectoral ministries — for improvement and feedback submitted by the ministries was incorporated before its submission to the Prime Minister Office.

The process of quarterly performance review will enable the prime minister to keep track of his government’s performance.

This system will not only help all divisions set their annual targets but also create space to embed the reform agenda into the government’s system.

The targets collectively reviewed quarterly through a digitised platform will play a key role in identifying bottlenecks and addressing cross-ministerial coordination challenges.