President Asif Zardari insists that his party had contested elections on the platform of Roti, Kapra and Makan and is determined to provide relief to people. What one has seen happening in the last six months however is a steady rise in poverty with 44 percent population living below poverty level, according to Advisor Finance Shaukat Tarin. It is not clear how the president and his party are going to retrieve their promise. In case they follow the strategy devised by their predecessors, they are likely to leave the country poorer and less governable than it was when the coalition government took over. There are no signs of their deviating from the model that has prevailed so far. This development model helps the ruling elite comprising the military top brass, political leaders and government functionaries to prosper at the expense of the masses. It allows the rulers to enjoy privileges, helps them steal from the state exchequer and take bribes and then deposit the money in foreign banks or invest it abroad. On Monday a senator belonging to the ruling coalition and himself a businessman claimed in the House during the debate that a Pakistani Banker had deposits worth $2.50 billion in foreign banks while two politicians held over $3 billion in overseas accounts. Successive governments since the Ayub have advocated the notorious trickle down doctrine. Let the rich get richer, they said, because the wealth thus accumulated would finally trickle down to the common man who would make use of the increased earnings to educate his children and improve his standard of living. While wealth concentrated in a few hands, mostly it was wasted on imported luxuries or taken outside the country leaving the poor poorer. Since the Ayub era the ruling elite has sought foreign loans maintaining that these could ensure a faster rate of development. With money in their hands they used it with abandon, spending it lavishly on maintaining a big and expensive government. Unnecessary ministries and departments were created and fabulous amounts were spent on the maintenance of government offices and ministers' residences and purchase of brand new cars for them. Every government consequently lived beyond its means. As misappropriation of public funds was difficult under a transparent system, access to information was denied by successive governments. With the leadership violating rules and procedures to help cronies, bureaucracy too followed suit. Bad governance suited the ruling elite. Self-reliance requires tightening of belts and self-sacrifice for which it has never been an option with the ruling elite nor is it with the present leadership. Prime Minister Gilani's directive to the ministers to use smaller cars was treated with disdain for the simple reason that the elite not only wants to accumulate wealth but likes to show it off too. The ministers continue to travel in their luxury salon cars while the prime minister looks sheepishly the other way. For all intents and purposes Mr Zardari too is following the age old model. Last month he decided to take out the begging bowl. He sought a sum of $100 billion to turn the country round. Advisor Finance Shaukat Tarin brought it down to a more modest $10 billion to $15billion and finally to $3billion to $5billion within the next 30 days to avoid the impending default. Meanwhile the PML-N leadership criticised the recourse to IMF, talking vaguely about "homegrown solutions" without spelling out what these precisely meant. Political parties in Pakistan have less appetite for working out a sustainable economic strategy than jockeying for power. The problem this time is that the developed countries who are reeling under the impact of the global financial crisis are reluctant to lend. The government is thus forced to knock at the door of the IMF. Meanwhile lakhs of common people who had been harassed over the last few months by the rising food prices and were forced to spend hours sometime day after day standing in queues outside utility stores for atta are now on the streets against inflated electricity bills. This has happened at the end of an eight year military rule under Gen Musharaf when poverty had supposedly been brought down by many digits, inflation reduced, and the exchequer filled with billions of dollars. Economy was projected to be on a high growth trajectory. There are no indications that Mr Zardari is going for a model based on self-reliance, lesser dependence on foreign assistance and an improved governance. The promise of Roti, Kapra and Makan thus remains a pie in the sky. E-mail: azizuddin@nation.com.pk