File photo of Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi
In letter to SAPM on Establishment, foreign minister seeks clarity on benchmarks used for qualitative review, which accounted for 30% of total score
Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Friday questioned the criteria used to determine the top performing federal ministries by Special Assistant to the P.M. Shehzad Arbab, maintaining that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ “demonstrated performance” does not match its 11th place ranking.
In a letter addressed to Arbab, Qureshi noted that of the 26 targets for the first quarter of the Performance Agreement, his ministry achieved 22 targets, with one nearly complete and three others delayed for reasons already explained. “I was informed by your letter of Nov. 22 that the average completion rate of all ministries was 62%, whereas the Ministry of Foreign Affairs had achieved 77% rate of target completion in the 1st quarter,” he wrote.
Similarly, he said, of the 24 targets set for the 2nd quarter, 18 were fully achieved; 4 were at “75-99% of completion stage” and two could not be pursued. “The Performance Review Committee (PRC) confirmed that target completion rate of the [Foreign] Ministry was 89.2% quantitatively (62.5 of 70 weightage-wise),” he added.
In his letter, the foreign minister maintained that his ministry had demonstrated “sustained commitment” toward achieving the targets established in the performance agreement and had also “completed several high impact activities” that had not been listed previously. “Hosting of extraordinary session of the OIC Council of Foreign Ministers at short notice of 45 days was the landmark achievement of the Ministry during the review period and was duly acknowledged by the prime minister,” he wrote, lamenting that “no concern” had been raised about the quality of the ministry’s targets during either the final approval of the performance agreement or at the time of peer review.
“The belated introduction of rating ministries by the PRC through quantitative weightage (70%) and qualitative weightage (30%) raises some fundamental questions on the mechanism of peer review of the performance agreement,” he said, noting specifically that “no written modalities/guidelines for the 30% qualitative review process have been shared with the ministries.” Seeking clarity on the benchmarks used by the PRC for qualitative evaluation, he similarly sought details on the “competencies” of the membership of the PRC.
“The TORs [Terms of Reference] of PRC are also not notified. What is basis for having permanent members of PRC? International best practices for peer review processes do not involve permanent members,” he said, adding that an “early response” was necessary for the Foreign Ministry to “engage meaningfully in the future review process.”
Earlier this week, Prime Minister Imran Khan awarded 10 ministers with appreciation certificates for their outstanding performance. The ministers that attracted praise were Communications Minister Murad Saeed; Planning Minister Asad Umar; Special Assistant on Poverty Alleviation Sania Nishtar; Education Minister Shafqat Mahmood, Human Rights Minister Shireen Mazari; Industries and Production Minister Khusro Bakhtiyar, Adviser on National Security Division Moeed Yusuf, Adviser on Commerce Razak Dawood, Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, and Minister for National Food Security Fakhar Imam.
The entire process has invited controversy, with ministers who did not receive the certificates questioning the criteria and rubbishing the government initiating a process that was best left to the public itself. One of the PTI’s allied parties, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, has openly criticized the process, saying the PRC results do not reflect ground realities.
Speaking with media, MQM-Pakistan chief Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui, who heads the I.T. Ministry, said the government had failed to acknowledge its “significant” performance. “We [MQM] have increased I.T. exports of the country by 50 percent, but we were nowhere on the top 10 list,” he said.