Federal Finance Minister Dr Hafeez Shaikh presented the budget. Or did he? The budget speech was already available to a TV channel even as the Cabinet was busy at its traditional pre-budget meeting, according its approval to the taxation proposals. However, the taxation proposals, supposedly so secret that they are not distributed to the members of the National Assembly with the budget speech but only when delivered, were also available before the speech itself. Though the tradition of budget secrecy owes to the simple fact of its being the occasion on which the taxation proposals are presented to the nation, and further it owes itself to the fact that the proposals do not take effect from the beginning of the new financial year, but immediately, it has been elevated into a high principle on its own. This, probably, owes itself to the budget being a British tradition imposed on Pakistan. However, budget secrecy means that its breach is supposed to be punished swiftly with the resignation of the offending Finance Minister (or, in the British case, the Chancellor of the Exchequer), and the UK does provide an example as recently as the middle of the last century, when the offending Chancellor resigned. Admittedly, the leak (which consisted of a silence to a question, which translated into a headline about a tax on beer) was not deliberate, but that does not help, not in the case of the budget. The fiscal year is supposed to be July to June, but that seems to be the financial year, according to which government servants get salaries. The fiscal year in the strictest sense of the year on which taxation accounts are based, apparently runs from budget to budget. In a way, that makes sense. What if the taxes were supposed to run from July 1 one year to June 30 the next? However, the taxation measures, or rather the amendments to existing tax legislation is effective from the announcement. Since that used to include a wide number of measures, from the postage to the price of petrol and electricity. The state still sets these prices, but delinked from the budget, and on a monthly basis, in the case of electricity, and weekly, for fuel. But the states entry into price-setting owes, perhaps, more to the war economy from which India moved to independence for India and Pakistan that the state would be happy admitting. Whatever the origin, knowledge of the budget proposals would lead to profiteering. If you knew that the price of postage was going up, you could probably corner postage stamps. There was a legendary shopkeeper, who would bar himself inside his shop when the budget speech was broadcast on the radio (those being days without TV), and reopen after it, with new prices money could be made if the budget is not kept secret. There is some logic in arguing that the Pakistani budget does not carry such an impact now, and thus secrecy should be relaxed. This is inherent in the suggestion that, after being presented, it should be considered by a committee. Another aspect of this suggestion is that it would save the members from having to bother their heads with figures, and has behind it the assumption that 'ordinary people cannot handle the figures. It is this attitude which is behind the difficulty faced in filling the Finance Ministers post, even though it is probably the most powerful after the Prime Ministers. The myth of Finance Ministers needing a head for figures was busted by none other than Winston Churchill, who is one of the Britons to have presented five budgets, but who was a self-confessed duffer at mathematics. He was offered the job in the hope that he would refuse it, but he was too desperate for office to do so. And ended up presiding over the UKs slide into the Great Depression. Finance Ministers are supposed to take decisions in the Cabinet-style of government: On which taxes to impose or withdraw, increase or decrease, and which to spend on, in the light of the governments political priorities. This does not mean a deep knowledge of economics. At first sight, it should mean that projects in the constituency would be funded, but in a culture where a Ministers first priority is to use his office for his constituency (and where constituents do not see anything wrong, or any irony, in demanding that their MNA be made a Minister for this very reason), it is not a popular Ministry in the Lower House, having last been held by an MNA when Ishaq Dar was Mian Nawaz Sharifs Finance Minister a decade ago. He has now gone to the Senate. The Finance Ministry is one of the ministries to which military regimes love appointing technocrats, like Shaukat Aziz in the Musharraf government, or Ghulam Ishaq Khan in the Zia government. One was a banker, the other a bureaucrat. Since Ishaq, only Yasin Wattoo had been Finance Minister while a member of the National Assembly. Apart from him, Finance Ministers have generally been Senators. At present, however, with Waqar Ahmad Khan as Finance Secretary, Pakistan has probably got a Finance Ministry 'dream team, with both the Minister and the Secretary holding doctorates in economics. Previously, Ministers labelled technocrats were often merely bureaucrats with previous experience in financial departments. For example, Ghulam Ishaq Khan, though no doubt a veteran, was academically a graduate in physics and mathematics. Present-day bureaucrats may have been to the US on scholarship to study economics, in the name of capacity building, but they have yet to become Ministers. If the 'dream team can only come up with the budget that was presented, the country has a right to demand a rethink of technocrats, or rather of their place in the Finance Ministry. The Finance Minister will only be as good as the team he gets, and that will have been determined in advance, in the case of senior officials, perhaps decades in advance. His own role will not depend on his academic qualifications, but on how he shapes career paths. And that might take a low priority for two reasons: First, the people involved are junior and relatively voiceless. Second, the benefit will not be to himself, but to future Finance Ministers, which is an incentive for postponement in a busy Ministry. This means that the military has got the wrong end of the stick (As usual, many would say), and technocrats are not the answer to the Finance Ministry, or any other. Another Ministry afflicted with technocrats has been Petroleum, with the Musharraf government making a Minister of an oil industry veteran. That didnt stop the oil crisis. The present government has also inducted an expert, with a retail distribution crisis one immediate result. The military love of technocrats comes because that is how they think of themselves as coming to fix the country. But also, there is the American example before them, and it looks to the US for governance models, while Pakistan has a Westminster model of government. Because the country is not comfortable with this model, with generalist Ministers but expert bureaucracies, there is a yen for experts to be in control. However, economies are dicey things. Budgets require expertise. Budget secrecy is required, but there a different kind of expertise is required, a knowledge of parliamentary practice, which the PM, as a former Speaker, should have. The only reason he could have for tolerating his presence in Cabinet is that he is an expert, and no one wants the job. n Email: maniazi@nation.com.pk