While important to admit past mistakes, it is more important to move beyond blame and

towards the serious task of nation building. We have no choice but to work together to carve
out a charter of governance, based on strengthening democracy, improving service delivery,
ensuring accountability, and upholding the rule of law.

Democracy: (i) Though mutilated by military dictators and civilian despots, reviving the
social contract is only possible within the near-consensus 1973 Constitution. (ii) Any
constitutional amendments must be undertaken only after extensive parliamentary and public
debates, and with active involvement of civil society. (iii) The National Assembly’s tenure
may be curtailed to four instead of five years, with a maximum of two four-year tenures for
the chief executives of the federation and provinces. (iv) Free and transparent elections must
be ensured by an independent, empowered election commission, and dispensing with
superficial, arbitrary and expensive caretaker governments. (v) Senators should be elected
through a direct vote of the people instead of a patronage-based, selection-cum-election
process. (vi) The federal cabinet should not exceed 25 ministers or ministers of state;
comprising 50 per cent MNAs, 25pc senators and 25pc technocrats, appointed by the prime
minister subject to simple-majority ratification by parliament. No minister or adviser should
be a dual national. (vii) Effective elected local governments must be put in place.

Service delivery: (i) There should be zero-tolerance for military involvement in federal,
provincial and local governments. The current practice of accommodating serving and retired
military personnel in civilian departments causes widespread resentment. Due to its discipline
and organisational skills, military assistance should be sought during crises like Covid-19 and
natural disasters. (ii) A significant number of civil servants have become politically aligned
and in some cases corrupt; an independent commission should scrutinise and send home the
incorrigible lot. (iii) Promotion to BPS-22 should not be monopolised by one service group;
5pc from each cadre may form the apex of the civil services pyramid, with those from smaller
provinces given their due share through a merit-based process. (iv) In appointing federal
secretaries as head of divisions within ministries, specialists over generalists should be
preferred; 25pc of technical and commerce-related divisions and departments should be
headed by technocrats and professionals, on a fixed three-year term through an open selection
process. (v) Security of tenure must be ensured. Removal, transfer or disciplinary action
should be through an institutional process of inquiry. (vi) Key performance indicators should
be approved and independent monitoring mechanisms instituted. (vii) The practice of doling
out plots to civil servants, judges and defence personnel on nominal charges should be
dispensed with.

Accountability: (i) NAB can be restructured along the lines of Hong Kong’s Independent
Commission against Corruption. (ii) No one should be arrested during complaint verification
and inquiry stages. (iii) Arrests of white-collar criminals should not be arbitrary; the
chairman, prosecutor general and director general should reach a consensus and then seek the
judge’s approval to arrest an accused. (iv) Accountability court judges should not be
appointed by the federal government but by the five-member administration committee
headed by the chief justices of the high courts, for a three-year term. (v) 90-day pre-trial
detention should be curtailed to 30 days. If a reference has not been decided within 60 days,
the accused should be released on bail and placed on the ECL. (vi) Chairman NAB should be
appointed after meaningful consultation between the chief justice of Pakistan, the prime
minister and leader of the opposition, subject to ratification by the Senate, for a non-
extendable four-year term.
Rule of law: (i) Judges should have unimpeachable integrity and administer justice without
fear or favour; ie a completely independent judiciary. (ii) The process of judges’ appointment
to the superior courts should be improved and streamlined. (iii) Certain administrative powers
of the chief justices should be regulated through a committee-based system. (iv) Suo motu
powers may be reviewed in accordance with draft rules prepared by a former chief justice so
that the exercise of this authority is streamlined. (v) Police should be depoliticised and
accountable to citizens. Institutional safeguards need to be provided. An independent
commission may be constituted to implement the January 2019 recommendations by the
Police Reforms Committee. (vi) Security of tenure of police commanders must be ensured in
federal and provincial departments. (vii) Civilian and military intelligence agencies must
work within a legal framework legislated by parliament, and monitored by an IG appointed
by parliament under a statutory framework of oversight. (viii) Fundamental rights must be
jealously safeguarded; freedom of expression must not be muzzled, and no one should be
illegally detained or tortured by any segment of the security apparatus.

Such a charter of governance, though limited in scope, would nudge our republic from
authoritarianism to egalitarianism; from totalitarianism to humanitarianism; from oppression
to magnanimity; from fear to trust; from dual standards to unity of purpose. Above all, it is a
message to our leaders not to rule but to govern. They should pay heed to Goethe’s words: “It
is bad governments, not bad people, who cause revolutions.”

The writer is a former IG Police and author of The Faltering State and Inconvenient Truths.