Malik M Aslam Awan
ON the Anti-Corruption Day, PM Imran Khan launched Anti-Corruption App. “report corruption” and addressing the ceremony lauded the CM Punjab Usman Buzdar for launching the anti-corruption app “Report Corruption”. Since long Imran Khan is emphatically laying stress that corruption is a great barricade in the economic growth of the country. He seemed rhetoric enough to elaborate the vices of corrupt practices and its dark impacts on the economic stability of the country. Intellectuals of the whole world are unanimous in assertion that corruption rampant countries cannot flourish vibrantly and lag behind in economic growth. Being precise we can say corruption is a snake whose poison will make burst the economy, permeating to the every vein from nail to brain of body of the nation and resultantly paralyse whole system of the country.
The Prime Minister expressed the hope that the app. will help in transforming Pakistan into a modern and transparent nation. He praised the performance of NAB and Punjab anti-corruption establishment for recovering looted national wealth. The Prime Minister said these institutions have been successful in recovering billions of rupees from corrupt elements, which need to be widely publicized. He said the recovered wealth will be spent for the uplift and betterment of people. P.M. regretted that people are unaware about the vital link between corruption and their miseries. Referring the example of China, he said, hundreds of people including ministers have been put into jails on graft charges in order to eradicate corruption from their country. He said in Iraq Lebanon, Chile and other countries people are protesting on roads against corruption of their rulers. He further said that in this age it is not easy to hide corruption. He further elaborated that corruption hit countries are poor and transparent nations are very prosperous and affluent. He spelt out that corruption free countries are economically more strong and their masses are happier than the masses of corruption-hit countries.
Speaking on the occasion Punjab Chief Minister Usman Buzdar said that government is committed to eradicating the menace of corruption from the province. Buzdar reaffirmed that PTI Government will fulfil its agenda of justice and accountability. He said anti-corruption establishment of Punjab had retrieved land worth of 132 billion rupees and about 4.75 billion rupees were deposited in the national exchequer. He urged upon the people to play a pivotal role to help the government to eradicate corruption from the very fabric of governmental texture. Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Accountability Shehzad Akbar expressed the resolve that they will digitalize the Punjab anti-corruption establishment on the direction of CM Punjab. He also added that the launching of the App is a step forward to automate the system. He was of the view that the App will prove a whistle blower. When we have a retrospective analysis of the performance of anti-corruption establishment, we find hardly remarkable recovery from corrupt elements. The performance of ACE was not noteworthy and corrupt elements seemed to be at liberty to do what they liked.
Corrupt Public functionaries were saping the national exchequer fearlessly and making the country economically weaker and vulnerable to the onslaught of world criticism. It has been a rampant practice in Pakistan that government functionaries made it obligatory upon themselves not to waste even a single moment they availed to loot, even from a single penny to billions. The number of honest officials is like the salt in the bread. Corrupt elements in government structure have looted public funds so mercilessly as if they are aliens and will go back to their own homelands after a devastating plundering of the soil of Pakistan. Fabulous stories of the merciless looting of national exchequer have hotly touched the hearts of patriotic thinkers. One is stunned listening the embezzlement of billions but the recoveries in millions. Then one is to form an opinion that it is mere a cat and mouse game. It is a common practice in Anti-Corruption establishment that there is a drum beating at the time of registration of a case against a corrupt official but later on one cannot know what happened about the case. After a long span of time one came to know that the allegations of corruption could not be substantiated during investigation. People were fatigued at the hands of anti-corruption to such an extent that they named it as the “Aunt of Corruption”. But now, the authorities said people can check the stage of any inquiry. PM Imran Khan and CM Punjab Usman Buzdar might be fully aware of the glaring fact that the refurbish of the image of ACE is a high time necessity of the age. With the old image and functioning of the ACE the desired results are quite impossible. The glazing of ACE from bottom to top be executed to make it a result-oriented institution. Political interference in the institutions have tarnished the image of ACE/Police, which is required to be reduced to minimum and the corrupt elements (from within the texture of ACE must be weeded out to ensure transparency and justice.
Since long people have dreamt that Pakistan will be a corruption free state and a new era of economic growth and prosperity will commence in making Pakistan a great economy of the world, not yearning for grants and loans but contributing largely to the economic growth of poor countries of the world. With the Providence of God Almighty Pakistan is an agriculture country and rich in all kinds of natural resources. Sinister minds have looted its resources and erected pyramids of wealth abroad. We need to get back that looted money to give a boost to our economy. General masses are heartfully agreed with the vision of Prime Minister and are eager to make concerted efforts to eliminate corruption from Pakistan to save the country from vulture traited governmental functionaries and politicians who have ruthlessly notched the national wealth and weakened the national economy. Laundered money is required to be seized and brought back to the country and be spent on the betterment of the masses. People who have plundered the national exchequer be dealt with severe, deterrent and exemplary punishment. And to save the country from the corruption expeditions the example of China be followed to make the country corruption free and on the path of accelerated progress and prosperity. Since the creation of Pakistan the masses have heard and experienced so many loud and rhetoric claims of every upcoming government but all the professed claims remained a mirage to the utter disappointment of the nation.
—The writer is a freelance columnist and independent analyst based in Lahore.
