ISLAMABAD: Senate Chairman Syed Yousaf Raza Gilani on Wednesday called for restoring student unions and putting in place a strong and empowered local government system, saying both were necessary to prepare future leadership and deepen democracy in the country.
Speaking at a UNICEF-organised workshop titled “Strengthening Parliamentary Oversight of Public Expenditure Management” in Islamabad, Gilani said leadership nurseries at the grassroots had become dormant and needed to be reactivated to help address the leadership vacuum in Pakistan.
Referring to his own political career, the Senate chairman said he had begun public life at the local level and later rose to the office of Prime Minister of Pakistan, besides serving in different constitutional positions. He said empowered local bodies at district and tehsil levels were essential for good governance, transparency, accountability and effective use of public funds.
Gilani said the transparent, efficient and responsible use of public resources was a constitutional duty of Parliament and vital for retaining public trust. He observed that Parliament’s role should not end with approving the budget, but must also include ensuring that national resources were used properly and that their benefits reached the people.
He said budgetary allocations alone could not ensure development results unless funds were released on time, institutions performed their duties and public spending produced visible improvements in citizens’ lives. He stressed that every rupee spent from the public exchequer should show measurable results in terms of economy, efficiency and effectiveness.
The Senate chairman said Pakistan’s development needs and limited financial resources required effective parliamentary oversight in key areas, including education, health, nutrition, sanitation and social protection. Parliamentary committees, he added, must ensure that resources reached deserving segments of society and were spent for the purposes for which they were allocated.
Citing Sustainable Development Goal 16, Gilani said accountable, transparent and effective institutions were central to sustainable development. He urged Public Accounts Committees to go beyond pointing out financial irregularities and to examine the reasons behind them, including weak planning, poor internal controls, procurement shortcomings and flaws in project implementation.
He said the committees should also recommend institutional reforms and corrective steps. Audit observations, he added, should be prioritised on the basis of financial significance, repeated irregularities, systemic weaknesses and their effect on public interest.
Gilani underlined the need to strengthen parliamentary committees through professional support, access to reliable information, better coordination with the Office of the Auditor General, capacity-building of members and improved analytical capacity for meaningful budget scrutiny.
He said parliamentary accountability must remain impartial, evidence-based and constructive so that institutional performance and public service delivery could be improved.
Punjab Assembly Speaker Malik Muhammad Ahmad Khan, Federal Minister for Planning and Development Prof Ahsan Iqbal, Azad Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly Speaker Chaudhry Tariq Farooq, Auditor General of Pakistan Maqbool Ahmad Gondal and UNICEF Representative in Pakistan Pernille Ironside also addressed the workshop, along with other distinguished participants.
In his concluding remarks, the Senate chairman appreciated UNICEF’s efforts for strengthening parliamentary oversight, transparency and public financial accountability. He expressed the hope that the workshop would lead to practical recommendations for effective use of national resources and meaningful improvements in the lives of the people.
