Back to governance.

Byline: Maleeha Lodhi

DESPITE sporadic agitational activity by the opposition, Prime Minister Imran Khan has enough political space to consider acting on a number of fronts to repurpose his government. His government has a window of opportunity to take initiatives and focus on governance rather than the opposition. This will also demonstrate that it has gone past the phase of its unifocal preoccupation with the opposition.

While PDM has continued efforts to mount political pressure it has been unable to force a crisis to challenge the PTI government or warrant its full-time attention. This means the government has the chance to get down to serious business and set, as well as, elaborate its agenda for the year ahead.

Among the steps it might consider are: 1) engage more actively at the leadership level in managing the pandemic and laying out the vaccination plan; 2) recast the cabinet and its team in Punjab; 3) reach out to the business community to encourage investment and boost productivity and growth; 4) plan for comprehensive civil service reform; 5) undertake a wide-ranging review of foreign policy.

Although the Covid-19 situation is not as alarming as it is in other countries, including in the neighbourhood, this is no reason to be sanguine about the future. Especially so because examples from elsewhere show that cases surge when complacency or fatigue sets in, or when new variants enter the country. A hands-on approach by the leadership is needed in a number of areas: robust public messaging (virtually absent now), increased testing, as well as ensuring SOP compliance by businesses/ markets/ educational institutions. Above all, the government must ensure that procurement of vaccines is swiftly done. It is already behind the curve on this count. There is little clarity about which vaccines will be secured given the global challenge of unequal access with richer countries monopolising initial supplies. Yet to be explained is how vaccines will be rolled out across the country. The Pakistan Medical Association has also asked for clarification and criticised the government for lack of plans to vaccinate people. The prime minister should himself lay out the national vaccination plan as this is obviously the only way to exit from the pandemic.

The government has political space to take initiatives and shift its attention to governance from the opposition.

Mid-term is also an appropriate time for the government to reconfigure its team. The...