Lights out

By starting with itself, the government is trying to send a message that no one will be spared from paying its dues.

Many will take the disconnection of gas and electricity supplies to top governmental installations with a pinch of salt — and rightly so. However, while it could very well be gimmickry by the government to lend more credibility to its action against utility bill defaulters, the message is still one that has to be sent. Non-payment of utility dues has long been a problem in Pakistan, which already suffers from a crippling gas and power crises, and most of the defaulters belong to the social, political, financial and military elite of the country — at least in terms of the percentage of the total outstanding amounts due to the power utilities such as the Islamabad Electric Supply Company (IESCO) and the Sui Northern Gas Pipeline Limited (SNGPL), which run into billions.

Non-payment is a key reason behind the phenomenon of circular debt, which needs no explaining here. Ironically, among these defaulters are the highest of state offices, both civilian and military, which provides a precedent for others to follow suit. By starting with itself, and cutting off installations such as the Parliament House and the Prime Minister’s Secretariat, the government is essentially trying to send a signal to the public — both the common man and elite: no one will be spared from paying its dues. Anti-default drives are inherently an exercise in public display and require a lot of noise and publicity for them to be successful. It is not without coincidence that one of the most brash parliamentarians of the ruling PML-N is spearheading this drive.

It is not only a matter of recovering dues, but ensuring that due recovery is streamlined in the future by instilling a sense of fear and accountability — or at least public shaming. In terms of the drastic move of cutting off key state installations, the idea is to not only that money be recovered, but be seen to be recovered from the highest offices of the land, and for the exercise to be extended further to other quarters, public and the military. Of course, the operational part of this strategy would involve these governmental installations and departments actually paying up after so much noise has been made. And there’s the rub.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 1^st, 2014.

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