Daily Times

In most levelheaded, rational societies, good deeds do rewards make. However, in Pakistan, the less you do, the more you have to gain it seems. Our parliamentarians seem to have deliberated on the fact that in these crises-ridden times, the one thing the country needs more than anything is to see a substantial increase in their salaries (the parliamentarians, not the public). The National Assembly (NA) Standing Committee on Parliamentary Affairs has recommended an increase in the salaries and allowances of parliamentarians equal to the upper limit of the emoluments of federal secretaries. The NA speaker and deputy speaker were not forgotten in this recommendation either. That seems about fair: increase their perks, privileges and financial compensation for work and duties they have hardly played any part in during the last two years!

In all the time the PML-N government has been in power, one would be hard pressed to list even one outstanding piece of legislation our parliamentarians have passed. Some bills have been passed, but mostly moved by the opposition. We hear sorry tales of how assembly sessions are usually bare with limited attendance by the parliamentarians whose only job it is to attend, listen and deliberate upon how to resolve issues affecting the people. That pretty much sums up the term ‘public servant’. The masses have seen their lot go from bad to worse in the last few years with vital issues that should be right at the top of parliamentarians’ priority list, such as healthcare and education, being left unaddressed. Let us even forget about the vital need to build more schools, staff the ghost schools we have with faculty and facilities, uplift the deplorable state of government-run healthcare centres, increase the wages of government employees who are not paid on time, sometimes for months on end, and the rising cost of all essential goods; let us forget about it all and concentrate on the fact that Pakistan is going through its most trying and bloodstained period. Let us focus on the fact that now, more than ever, we need to rebuild our country, reinvest in our people, rehabilitate the internally displaced persons (IDPs) and come together to fight the monster of militancy that is tearing this nation apart. At such a point in our history, our lacklustre parliamentarians deem it fit to invest in themselves rather than deliberate on the needs of the people, to further fatten their own pockets. It is enough to make one sick.*