Anaemic growth under civilian rule.

Byline: Nasir Jamal

The country has seen two elected governments complete their terms since the last period of military rule ended in 2008. It's a new milestone for its frail democracy.

This is in spite of a lot of political noise and turmoil that marked the decade under the civilian rule as certain elements asserted their powers to undermine the democratic process and politicians.

The economy also experienced extreme turbulence during this period because of a number of factors like perpetual political volatility, massive flooding across the country, global financial meltdown, steep reduction in official capital inflows owing to changing geopolitical realities, sharp decline in foreign and domestic private investment and dependence of policymakers on public and private consumption for propelling growth.

Each of the three governments voted into power since 2008 inherited a financial and policy mess, which forced them to turn to the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

In the last 10 years, economic growth remained anaemic, budget deficits widened, investment fell, exports decelerated and imports spiked sharply as the economy shuffled from one crisis to another - a phenomenon often explained by the experts as boom-and-bust cycles.

The public debt has surged steeply over time and the nation's requirements for large capital inflows to meet its budget and debt financing needs are rising. The recent, sharp decrease in the purchasing power of middle-class households is compelling many of us to compare the economic performance of the civilian governments with that of the Musharraf regime in the 2000s when most middle-class families saw their disposable income grow significantly and rapidly.

Indeed, macroeconomic numbers show that the economy had performed much better under the dictatorial regime between 2000 and 2008. For instance, the economy grew at an average annual rate of 4.53 per cent, private credit off-take rose from 16pc of GDP to 27pc and the public debt shrank from 76pc to 58pc.

The fiscal deficit was also brought under control as it mostly fluctuated around 4pc or less before resurging to 7.3pc in 2008. Foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows also spiked to $5.4 billion from a mere $473 million as the investment rate averaged 17.8pc during the 2000s.

The economic numbers for the 2010s compare rather poorly with the data for the preceding decade. The average economic growth rate came down to 4.2pc, investment averaged 15.3pc of GDP and...