Why Did Access To Justice Program Fail in Pakistan?

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan
Mukhtar Paras Shah

National Graduate Institute of Policy Studies, Tokyo
Why did Justice Plan fail? Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan
Mukhtar Paras Shah
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Dedicated to the people of Pakistan who have recently struggled and sacrificed to ensure and upheld the independence of judiciary in Pakistan
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This paper was written as part of a research assignment conducted at National Graduate Institute of Policy Studies, Tokyo in Japan. The document was produced under the supervision of Prof. Ryokichi Hirono who has been contributing in the global development scene for the last fifty years in various capacities. The image used on the cover page has been retrieved from the Access to Justice Program Website. This publication may be reproduced free of charge in any format or medium for research and private study. This is subject to it being reproduced accurately and not in a misleading context. The material must be acknowledged as copyright and the title of the publication specified. Further information or free copies of this publication can be obtained by sending an e-mail to mukhtarparas@gmail.com;calling 0092 51 2274840; faxing a request at 0092 51 9213740 or by writing to the MPS, 14-Kyber Block,Gulshen e Jinnah,Islamabad, Pakistan.
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ABSTRACT
It is widely believed that International Financial Institutions do not assess the commitment of client countries before extending heavy loans to them in the form of budgetary support. This results in failure of projects and programs that otherwise would contribute in social and economic uplift of the country as well as the people. Access to Justice Program in Pakistan is a recent example. The justice sector policy reform program was financed by Asian Development Bank in 2001. It failed to produce desired results and the burden of responsibility seems to fall on both the government as well as ADB. This paper takes into account the details of the donor driven program to deliberate on reasons that contributed in the failure of a high profile program in Pakistan.
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Index
1. Introduction 2. Objectives of AJP 3. Main Components 4. Implementation Arrangements 5. Achievements 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.4 6. Failures 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 6.6 6.7 6.8 6.9 Problems in Implementation Focus on Construction Work Issues in Policy Making Judicial Independence Empowering the Poor Judicial Governance Citizen Police Relationship Failure in Extension of Loan Role of ADB & Government Infrastructure development in Khyber Infrastructure development in Baluchistan Infrastructure development in Punjab Procurement of Computers Revamping Police Training
Page No
06 07 09 10 10 10 10 11 11 12 14 15 15 16 17 18 19 21 23 24
7.
Conclusion
25 Appendix-I
References
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Introduction Government of Pakistan (GOP) and Asian Development Bank (ADB) signed the Loan Agreement for Access to Justice Program (AJP) on 20 December, 2001. Total outlay of the loan was $350 million and it was considered as the first ever intervention in the justice sector by any donor in Pakistan. The challenges in justice sector at that time included improving incentives for judiciary as well as creating linkages of reform agenda to poverty alleviation and benefits for the public. (RRP-ADB, 2001)The tasks had been huge and a high quality judiciary was considered essential for democracy, rule of law, sustainable development and poverty reduction. There had been continuous calls and recommendations by various forums to reform the justice sector in Pakistan but no serious effort was ever made to improve the efficiency of police and courts. (Pakistan Law Commission Report,1993) When General Pervez Musharraf came to power in 2000, he being the military ruler felt the need to take some popular decisions in order to establish his rule. In this background, he announced the devolution plan and ultimately promulgated the Local Government Ordinance 2001. Focus on improving service delivery at grass-root level naturally highlighted need to improve the condition and working of judicial system in the country. The new military ruler was also under immense pressure to raise funds for public sector projects as well as to increase the foreign exchange reserves in order to improve the countrys economic indicators. In this backdrop, ADB approved this high sounding budgetary support program for Pakistan. The swiftness, with which all details and designs of AJP were finalized, is intriguing. The appraisal mission reached Pakistan in September, 2001 and in four months a comprehensive plan was finalized. The ultimate beneficiaries of the justice sector reform program were supposed to be the common poor citizens who had no proper access to courts for redressal of their miseries. The law and judicial sector had been chronically under-funded impairing the quality of judicial services. This malaise manifested in a monstrous backlog existing
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throughout the courts with chronic delays in disposal of cases of five, ten, even twenty years. Other problems included shortages of judges and courthouses, inadequate facilities, and a dismal system of compensation, giving rise to complaints of endemic corruption. It was thus natural to expect that experts and consultants responsible for designing the program would suggest components and activities that guaranteed easy, immediate and reliable justice to the citizens. ADB consultants held meetings with the judicial officers and Bar Associations and consolidated their demands in the form of a project. However, no serious effort was made to contact public in general to get specific direction required for AJP reforms and no country wide survey was conducted for this multi-million dollar justice sector intervention. A close study of the relevant documents reveals that it is difficult to establish connections between AJPs aims and undertakings. (Fact Finding Mission Report,2001) The rock-bed for AJP was therefore, faulty. The program lacked a clear direction as well as strategy to implement the schemes that had no connections with the set objectives. AJP team tried to improve the justice sector in Pakistan through schemes designed by their experts but when targets are measured with the benchmark of disbursement of loan, no effective results can be expected. The AJP not only spent most of their money on irrelevant projects but even failed to spend whole of the loan amount. The program failed to close in time and was extended twice in order to assist the completion of schemes. Program that was seen as element of countrys poverty reduction strategy, ultimately ended up by spending money on construction of offices and purchase of vehicles. Story of AJP in Pakistan ended on 31 June 2008 but it definitely raised myriad questions about the responsibility of the stakeholders.
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Objectives of AJP Access to Justice Program sought to enhance citizen's access to justice by ensuring the provision of security and equal protection of law to citizens, securing and sustaining entitlements for reducing the vulnerability of the poor. Main Components The total funding made available by ADB for achievement of this goal was $350 million of which $20 million was specified for technical assistance, $25 million for Access to Justice Development Fund (AJDF) and $305 million for program activities. (Loan Agreement, 2001) The program involved a vast amount of foundational work, much of which was complex and inter-dependent on other reforms in other sectors such as police, ombudsman. An effort was undertaken to improve the management of the courts. It included reviewing the courts' information management system, measuring judicial performance, refining performance standards and improving compensation systems. Initiatives were made to introduce continuing on the-job training for judges to improve judicial competence. A training-of-trainers program on curriculum development and presentation skills was conducted for the teaching faculty of Federal Judicial Academy. Many judges and court administrators were sent to other common law jurisdictions including Britain, Canada, the United States, Australia and Singapore to study the 'do-able' role-models of how courts could reassume control of their day-to-day proceedings. In the second and third phase efforts were made to address civic matters and reach out to the users and beneficiaries at the grass-root level. (AJP Judicial Journal, 2009) In order to improve the quality of judicial policymaking, an important initiative focused on expanding role and mandate of the Law and Justice Commission to include responsibility for coordinating the administration of justice. Another major component was the pilot project in delay reduction, which is arguably the earliest visible success of the program. This included a plan to dispose of pending cases. Chief justices of respective high courts endorsed the extension of the pilot project to all courts throughout the country. Proposals were also developed to revamp the process serving establishment agency, and to improve court relations
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by introducing bench-bar and citizen-court liaison committees in every district. The delay reduction project intended to introduce courts' automation plan which could provide a blueprint for major improvements in information management capacity across the justice sector. The training-of-trainers program at the Federal Judicial Academy was also worked out for foundation of training capacity within the judiciary itself. Publication of the bench book to provide a quality-assured practical tool for judges with extended shelf-life was also realized under AJP. Revamping of courts statistical reporting system and the first publication of annual performance reports for the courts in the past thirty years was also part of the plan. The designers of the program rightly identified that judicial reforms should focus on two sectors i.e. Justice Sector and Police Sector. It is interesting to note that reforms areas identified by AJP were very much relevant to the requirements. The AJP pledged to overhaul policy making in the justice sector by introducing steps to strengthen judiciary and by empowering the poor and the vulnerable. There could be no difference of opinion when AJP vouchsafed to introduce a transparent police force that vowed to foster better police citizen relationship. In the light of these targets, access to inexpensive justice, people friendly police and empowerment of the vulnerable and women in justice sector were identified as the three main components of AJP. Implementation Arrangements Ministry of Law (MOL) was identified as the Implementing Agency for AJP and a Project Management Unit (PMU) was formed to implement the program. The Program Director (PD) of AJP was supposed to be a senior officer representing government side with the mandate to implement the program. (RRP-ADB, 2001) According to the instructions it was required that no government officer should be given dual charge for the post of PD and he would not be transferred from that position in order to ensure effective implementation of the program. The PD had a large team consisting of officers responsible to implement AJP. A team consisting of professionals and experts hired by ADB were also there to assist the government team. A National Steering Committee (NSC) stationed in MOL was responsible for oversight of the activities under AJP.
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Achievements Following is the list of activities undertaken by AJP during the implementation of this justice sector program. These activities have been described by ADB as their achievements. Infrastructure Development In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa A sum of Rs.3459 million was utilized for renovation and construction of 110 Court Rooms and 81 residences for judges in various districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. This construction work in the District Courts in NWFP for District & Session Judges and Civil Judges was commenced to improve the working conditions of the lower judiciary. This work also includes construction of more than 150 litigant sheds, Bakhshi Khanas and lavatories in various districts as public facilities for litigants and general public. Construction of six judicial Complexes and two bar rooms was also part of infrastructure improvement efforts being undertaken under the Program. The land for the judicial complexes in Hazara, Malakand, Southern Region and Haripur was acquired with the expenditure of Rs.64 million. (DAWN, 2008) Approximately Rs.400 million was spent on the establishment of new offices, barracks, and renovation of infrastructure in police and prison departments. It included schemes such as construction of 24 District Investigation Headquarters, Provision of Medico-legal wards, Criminal Records Office, Construction of District Jail Hangu, lock-ups, guard-rooms, Installation of Close Circuit Cameras in Prison Department and other projects concerning improvement in access to justice and better services for the people. Infrastructure Development in Baluchistan As part of the financial plan, Balochistan was entitled to a share of Rs 1,140.8 million as per NFC formulae, of which Rs 1056.0 million were set for budgetary allocation and Rs 1,008 million were released by AJP for works on uplift schemes in the province. In judiciary, total 18 schemes with an estimated cost of Rs 258 million were carried out. As part of this financial plan, 35 court rooms and buildings, 27 residences for judicial officers, 16 litigant
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sheds with amenities, a judicial complex and a bar room were constructed and money was spent on the purchase of land for these works. The Police Department was also given Rs. 282 million establishment of new police lines, barracks and residential complexes for the police officials. The Prisons Department had reserved Rs 247 million for the construction of 10 barracks, 12 death cells and 54 lodges for jail staffers. (Daily Times, 2008) Infrastructure Development in Punjab Punjab was projected as a leading province in implementation of the AJP. The achievements included work on 410 construction schemes under the Program. Punjab was extended Rs. 6132 million under AJP and around 342 schemes were carried out with this amount. As part of this plan, 178 Court rooms and buildings, 329 residences for judicial officers, 52 buildings with amenities for litigants, 21 judicial complexes, 2 bar rooms, land acquisition at 8 places and 8 projects for raising the capacity of departments with information technology equipment were installed. (Nation, 2008) The Police Department with its share of PKR.327 million focused on establishment of 14 new Police Lines, 19 barracks and 13 residential complexes, 128 death cells, 64 residences for jail staff, 17 lavatories and 2 high security jails. The Law Department Punjab also utilized Rs.94 million on various infrastructure schemes in the province. The Home department in the province also spent Rs.13 million on the centralized automated record management on child protection & data base for prisoners, crime situation, law and order. Procurement of Computers AJP procured 1461 computers for courts throughout the country under AJP. Hi-tech Computers were procured after an international bidding for the automation of judiciary throughout Pakistan. Out of this lot, 600 computers were distributed in all the courts in Punjab whereas 317 machines were installed in courts in Sind. Similarly the share of NWFP and Baluchistan for these digital equipments was 207 and 82 respectively. The computers were also given to 67 Bar Associations around the country to enable Bars to fulfill their mandated responsibilities regarding legal matters. (AJP Newsletter, 2008) The provision of computers
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and other IT accessories to judiciary at a large scale was seen as an effort to improve efficiency of the courts. Digitalization of courts as a result of this intervention was expected to result in free and easy access to information for the common people concerning justice sector. (AJP Annual Report, 2008) Revamping of Police Training System AJP had taken a resolve to revamp the police training system in Pakistan in line with reforms introduced under New Police Order 2002. Ministry of Law and National Police Academy reached an agreement to exploit capacity building provisions in AJP and entered the second generation reforms. It may be recalled that first phase of reforms focused on infrastructure development of the judiciary and in the second phase focus was to target areas concerning police, prisons and professional training institutes in order to build linkages with them and to promote public grievance redress mechanism. (Khan,2005) In order to reach the objectives, AJP decided to strengthen National Police Academy by providing them with computers and forensic facility. Under this program 78 training modules were also prepared for police officers by a Police Reforms Specialist. Public Awareness AJP spend millions of rupees on publishing a varied range of simplified material on legal matters. The 227 booklets printed were meant for dissemination among the public and users of justice sector. The documents focused on themes of legal education and empowerment of the common people covering topics relevant to justice sector problems faced by the public in day to day life. AJP also published and disseminated 25 guidelines for the people on issues such as; how to acquire a National I D Card; how to register an FIR; how to register complaint against highhandedness of police officials; laws about consumer rights; legal cover for the rights of bonded labor and the like. (AJP Newsletter,2008)These booklets were written in Urdu and effort was made to reach out to the common people and impart the legal information through simplified messages. The material was disseminated at large scale through District
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Councils, Tehsil Councils, Union Councils, libraries and Public Information Kiosks established at District Courts. The emphasis of this public awareness campaign was also on newly introduced police reforms. Some attractive and informative posters were designed for people at the grassroots level so that they could know about their rights in the civic and administrative system of the government. These posters intended to educate the masses about information and procedures for grievance redress under New Police Order such as Role of District Public Safety Commission, Citizen Police Liaison Committee and mechanism of accountability of Police. Mr.Azhar Hasan Nadeem, Inspector General of Police in Punjab had directed to display these posters for public viewing in the Police Stations so that visitors may acquire information about their rights and mechanism of accountability under Police Reforms. Consumer Courts Eight Consumers Courts were established in Punjab that was headed by District and Session Judges. These courts established under the justice sector reform agenda were destined to play positive and effective role in extending maximum relief to the public. The concept of setting up consumer courts was to discourage the sub-standard articles of daily use and defective services to the masses. Access to Information AJP aimed at empowering the citizens to get access to information in the light of Freedom of Information Ordinance 2002. AJP understood that citizens inability to acquire timely and accurate information hinders their claim to fundamental entitlements. AJP launched a
nationwide public campaign on right to freedom of information. This campaign aimed at educating public to use their right to obtain information held by the public authorities. AJPs constant advocacy and lobbying with provincial governments and holding of activities with concerned stakeholders moved the provincial governments to enact Freedom of Information law. The Government of Balochistan enacted Freedom of Information Act 2005. This was followed by promulgation of Freedom of Information Ordinance by Governor of Sindh. Later
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Provincial Assembly, Sindh enacted the Ordinance into an Act in 2006. The Provinces of Punjab and NWFP did not take part in this imperative legislation. The AJP provided technical assistance in number of complementary actions to translate this policy initiative into effective implementation to strengthen right to access to information. Five capacity building workshops one in Islamabad and four in provinces were held. The participants include government officials of different departments, judicial officers, representative from civil society organizations, journalists, lawyers, political activists, bank officers, common people and students from universities and colleges. It also tried to dispel official mindset used to hide public information by labeling it as classified, secret and confidential. To further strengthen institutional mechanism computers were provided to the courts along with designing and installation of information management system to facilitate litigants as well legal community to take information about exact status of their cases. Capacity Building Capacity building has been the most misleading aspect of project implementation. It is worth mentioning that Rs.77 million were spent in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province for the capacity building of staff in courts of Additional and Session Judges and Rs.58 million were earmarked for the up-gradation and improvement of Civil Courts in the Province. Under these schemes, around 57 Additional Session Judges, 50 Civil Judges and more than 1242 sub-ordinate staff was recruited. These courts have also been provided with computers and other necessities to run the day to day affairs effectively. Failures Numerous local factors count much when a particular model of governance is being developed and applied in a country (Rhudy,2000). In the case of AJP local realities were neither studied thoroughly and nor were given a place in the strategy map. It resulted into a long list of disappointments during the implementation of AJP reforms. Following is a discussion summarizing some of the key problematic areas that surfaced during the AJP experience in Pakistan.
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Problems with Implementation Arrangements Ministry of Law being the IA was responsible for results in line with the set targets. However neither Minister for Law nor Secretary Law had enough time to dig deep into the details of implementation of AJP. In eight years it was only once that Minister for Law chaired a meeting on AJP. The Steering Committee could not meet regularly and usually its meeting was called only in emergency matters. Most of the Steering Committee meetings were held in 2005 and 2006 when AJP had been flagged as at risk program by the donors. In the initial phase of implementation the approval of Judicial Commission comprising of Supreme Court Judges gave approval for schemes being funded from Asian Development Fund Sources. Those judges either had no time to dispose off cases in time or were very conservative and careful in giving approvals. The PD was frequently changed and transferred from AJP and there were occasions when AJP had no boss for longer periods. The officers appointed in AJP from government side were incompetent and ineffective as they lacked competency. The ADB consultants were more concerned in disbursement of loan money and they had not made an effort to link the activities with set targets of AJP. The implementation arrangements for AJP were not in line with the requirements of an ambitious program. The program started in 2001 and for five long years no body realized that AJP needed some arrangements to look after the implementation of schemes in the respective provinces. It was only in 2005 that Provincial Management Units of AJP were introduced in the country but it was too late. The damage has already been done. Focus on Construction Work AJP received wide scale criticism on its focus on infrastructure development such as residences for judges and offices. Infrastructure already available might not have been enough but it was there. The analysts think that focus would have been on practical aspects of governance in spite of on construction work which has no relation with the plight of the poor. Same number of districts had same number of offices and courts even before AJP. It was argued by the experts that Justice is not in the bricks and stones but in the mindset and just
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sector reforms should have tried to change the perceptions and behavior of the stakeholders like police and judges towards the beneficiaries of judicial system. The equipment was also provided to digitalize major libraries in justice sector departments such as Law Department, Home Departments and Offices of the Ombudsman. The idea was to automate the police and justice sector by introducing automation of registration of Firs and to link the proceeding of court with computers. But this brilliant idea could not be translated into reality and expensive computers could only be used as typing machines. Issues in Policy Making AJP boasts of introducing amendments in Law Commission Ordinance 1979 as the most visible achievement on policy making front. The ordinance only expanded the mandate and composition of Law and Justice Commission of Pakistan by including Chief Justice of Pakistan in it. AJP considers the introduction of National Judicial Policy Making Committee (NJPMC) as its policy achievement. But ironically the inclusion of CJP in NJPMC was the most important factor that resulted in slow progress of development schemes under AJP. Target of AJP to revamp the justice sector policy was well set but tools employed and activities undertaken to reach the target were highly controversial. AJP in fact miserably failed in restructuring the justice sector in Pakistan for improving the service delivery for the poor and vulnerable. Policy initiatives such as promulgation of ordinances about access to information and dissemination of information about establishment of consumer courts were projected as policy achievements. But one feels like asking as to what were the changes in policy matters pertaining to procedures at courts and police stations that were introduced by AJP during the implementation period of eight years. Were any structural changes introduced for registration of First Information Reports (FIRs) at the police stations? Was access to courts at the grass-root level made better for the poor and vulnerable? What mechanism was adopted by AJP to ensure inexpensive justice for the disadvantageous groups in the light of its self-set targets? The answer is a big NO. None of the areas were touched and no effort was made under AJP to change the structure and improve the efficiency of justice sector in Pakistan.
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Judicial Independence ADBs Completion Report about AJP states that good progress was made to ensure independence of judiciary in Pakistan. The Project Completion Report (PCR, 2010) further explains that budgetary allocations for the federal level and the provincial levels were increased for the purpose. At federal level the budget for SC was increased from Rs.466 million in 2001 to Rs.926 million in 2008. Similarly provincial budgets were given an increase by 18%. Is increasing finances a guarantee for an independent judiciary? Was this a well worked out target? The ADB report does not however explains that this increase expenditure was spent on enhanced salaries of the judges and on purchase of vehicles. This strengthened and independent judiciary was sent home by General Pervez Musharraf in 2008 by sheer use of force and there was no mechanism in place to safeguard the secure presence of justice system in the political economy of the country. Even at the lower level simple separation of judiciary from executive was termed as the independence of judiciary which was in fact wrong. The separation of judiciary from the executive may be a step in the right direction but no institutional arrangements were suggested and introduced by AJP to handle the pressure faced by the lower courts. Simple flow of funds for schemes that had no relevance with the fate of the poor could not help at all. Provision of Inexpensive Justice? It is interesting to note the way AJP connects its achievements with the empowerment of poor. ADB thinks that their effort resulted in clearance of backlog of cases all around the country. They quote their own generated reports and say that as a result of case management reforms, judges disposed of around 25% more cases than before and this efficiency of courts was termed as equivalent to 0.5% growth in GDP. ADB seems to be of the view that this fiscal benefit has automatically been passed on to the poor and the vulnerable as they explain this efficiency under their target of ensuring inexpensive justice. According to studies (Armytage, 2003) CJP Mr.Iftikhar Chaudahry himself had been the cause of clearance of backlog of 80000 cases who had put all the judges in the country on their toes by increasing
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monitoring. AJPs claim to link it with provision of inexpensive justice seems interesting and speaks volumes of how AJP was handled by its team of professionals. ADBs AJP had introduced some legislative changes in filing of habeas corpus applications and amendments in Civil Procedure Code of 1908. Although the initiatives are welcome but ADBs claim that these changes resulted in provision of better access for the vulnerable needed to be supported by some statistics. Up till this time no study has been undertaken either by GOP or by ADB to testify the implications of the amendments made under AJP in the name improved access to justice system. The most propagated arrangement for inexpensive justice was the introduction of Musalihat Anjumun (MA) that was to be operationalized at Union Council level. This was an alternate arrangement for dispute resolution for the people but ADB itself admits that MAs could not be operationalized as envisioned under AJP. Empowering the Poor and Vulnerable It is recognized that inability to access to justice is the most obvious sign of inequality in society. (Abregu,2001) AJP tried to empower the poor and vulnerable by publishing booklets and pamphlets on various legal and procedural matters pertaining to courts and police. In a country where literacy rate for men is 65% whereas only 45% of women are literate, the decision to publish information booklets required qualification. Most important of all, it needed a justification whether it would really empower the major population of the country or not who are illiterate and have no access to published materials. More sad part of the story is that all the list of publications for empowering the people were published only in the last year of AJP implementation only to meet the targets set as exercise. The books and pamphlets were bundled in big bags and posted to District Coordination Officers all over Pakistan for circulation in the government agencies and offices. They never reached those for whom they were published i.e. the poor and the vulnerable. People waiting on the broken wooden benches in the police station courtyards were waiting for perhaps something else that AJP could not capture in their scheme of things.
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Judicial Governance The institutional obstacles in legal and judicial system of the developing countries have been the major cause of poor governance. (Anderson, 2003) When AJP talked about improving judicial governance, people at the lower strata of life thought that now measure would be taken to ensure that no official will extort money from the litigants and complainants and that only a simple application would set the court system to process his request for grievance redressal . However to our astonishment, activities undertaken by ADB in the name of judicial governance were quite different. Under this head, the judicial officers were offered three times rise in salaries and allowances and this exercise was unanimously agreed and adopted by GOP and ADB both. While judges qualified for new residences, renovated offices, new cars and enhanced salaries, police continued to extort money from the seekers of justice. Human Resource Development ADB states that there biggest achievement in order to develop the human resources under AJP was to help open a Law School at Lahore University of Management Science (LUMS).The said university is a leading private sector university where millionaire students can only afford to get admission and study. Similarly, development of some manuals and courses was undertaken for the Federal Judicial Academy (FJA) but unfortunately those manuals could not get clearance from the judges until the closure of AJP. Human resource development at FJA could therefore only be restricted to investment in renovation of office, building and library. ADBs project documents are silent about any component that focused on the training of the trainers at FJA. Ensuring Accountability in Police AJPs endeavor was to ensure an independent, accountable transparent and professional police. It is acknowledged by the analysts that adoption of Police Order 2002 by GOP was the landmark decision that could have transformed the working of police department in favor of the people. However one very fundamental mistake has already been done by the National Reconstruction Bureau (NRB) in this regard. Firstly, they tried to take complete inspiration
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from the British model and did not take into account the local expediencies and secondly they tried to implement the new Police Order through the Police Officers themselves who knew the tricks to maneuver the rules and provisions in their favor. The police officers had already become all the more powerful after the dissolution of the institution of Deputy Commissioner in the district. The vague and intricate schematization of oversight offered in Police Order 2002 made police department independent but in no way accountable. AJP exclaims that establishment of Public Safety Commissions (PSCs) at federal, provincial and district level represented by the public representatives was a great success. It would have been a huge achievement if these oversight bodies had actually become operational. Almost in all the provinces there were disagreements on the selection of members of PSCs and complaints about non-serious attitude of police officers towards the observations of PSCs became a common phenomenon. At national level National Public Safety Commission could not even become operational. The dismal performance of PSCs has been a sad story in the era of decentralization when AJP was given the responsibility to make police a people friendly department. Departments do not change cultures and mindset under the influence of ordinances and AJP without realizing the ground realities continued to measure their performance in terms of findings of seminars and workshops. Independent Prosecution According to the legislation under Police Order 2002, independent prosecution department was established to ensure transparent trials. Previously investigation and prosecution used to be handled by the same officers in police stations. The separation of both the departments must have been a brilliant idea but it did not work in Pakistan well at least till the closure of AJP. There were huge differences among the provinces over the implementation of this Police Order and even differences among the police officials continuously surfaced during the period. A workshop of police officers conducted in Faisalabad in June 2008 concluded that separation has created more confusion among the beneficiaries as well as the police officers. It was pointed out that separation of the two branches has created disconnect between the officers working under the same roof resulting in communication gaps.
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Creation of Independent Complaint Authority The right to get legal protection is the test of governments commitment to rights of the people (Harshcoff & Hollander, 2000) Establishment of independent complaint authorities was another ideal situation visualized by AJP without taking into account the ground realities. The target set by AJP was only to announce the establishment of complaint authorities but evaluation of the application of this philosophy was entrusted to no one. Interestingly the complaint authorities were merged in Public Safety Commissions which were already ineffective. The process of making a complaint was simple; an application on a plain paper against any police officer could initiate actions against him. But did it work? Did the head of public safety commissions ever initiated cases against police officers on general complaints? The answer is in negative. The weak pubic representatives lacked the sinews to challenge the authority and power of the police officers even if there was a complaint against them. The chairman of the PSC could only request the District Police Officer to initiate action against the offender police officials but nothing more than this. Under the law DPO was not obliged to ensure implementation on the recommendation of the Chairman of PSC. Even the statistics show that entirely insignificant number of complaints was registered against the police during this time and this happened in the country which is known as the police state. In this backdrop, it is unjustified on the part of AJP to claim the creation of independent complaint authority as one of their landmark achievements. Fostering better Police Citizen Relationship ADB had tied the release of third tranche of AJP loan amounting to $9,764,808,000 with governments efforts to foster Police-Citizen relationship. AJPs main plan revolved around Citizen Police Liaison Committees(CPLCs) and main inspiration was taken from the successful experience of Karachis City Police Liaison Committee that has been delivering since long and that too independent of any effort connected with AJP. GOP failed to muster up enough support for replication of CPLCs in all the districts of the country. They in fact categorically refused to legislate on this matter of high importance. Interesting part of the story is that ADB accepted the logic forwarded by GOP that legislation on CPLCs cannot be
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made. In order to fulfill the condition a Media and Communication Specialist was hired for only two months and that too only two months before the closing the loan date just to register that efforts to improve citizen police relationship were being done by AJP. As a result of this achievement, ADB released the third tranche of loan, badly needed by the government that faced financial constraints at that time. Raising Human Rights Awareness Legal empowerment is giving the people relevant skills and awareness to access institutions for grievance redress (Singh, 2009). AJPs list of achievement vaunts about the role they played in raising human rights awareness during the implementation of program. Details on the activities undertaken for this awareness campaign are nowhere to be seen in ADBs Project Completion Report. According to an inside information, no exclusive activities were designed or implemented by ADB or even GOP under the umbrella of AJP. In fact, material such as posters, booklets and pamphlets designed by the media and communication specialist is being referred under various topics as cross-cutting thematic activity. ADB used this two month activity to show achievement in connection with themes such as fostering citizenpolice relationship, raising human rights awareness and even gender empowerment. The reality is the AJP only produced two posters projecting the importance of women police in society. This published material was supposed to be circulated among all police stations and union councils for display. According to the sources, those pamphlets, booklets and posters were never circulated by AJP till the closure of the loan in 2008. Gender empowerment A good combination of Law, social justice and development can only help improve the condition of women in the developing countries (Dasgupta,2002). While commenting on their achievements on the issue of gender empowerment, AJP states that during the period of implementation of program, the number of share of women judges in the lower courts increased from 3.67% to 5.76% in the Punjab, from 5.88% to 11.90% in Balochistan, from 7.61% to 13.72% in NWFP, and from 7.30% to 15.45% in Sindh. They also add that five
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women police stations were set and a considerable number of women were recruited as traffic wardens in the light of this initiative. AJP, however is silent as to what statistical impact these initiatives had on empowering the common women in the society. Some empirical evidence should have suggested the connection between AJP initiative on recruiting women judges and women traffic police and social development indicators pertaining to crime and harassment of women in the society. It is not difficult to understand that ADB considered the activities undertaken by their consultants as the benchmarks and in real no change actually took place in society as a result of this multi-million dollar justice sector program. (Yasin and Shah, 2004) Failure in extension of TA Loan The TA Loan for AJP could have played a very important role in implementation of the whole justice sector reform. But lack of vision, strategy and leadership rendered the program useless. It has been argued by the experts that good practice should focus on the needs of the people at the beginning of the criminal justice system (Penal Reform International, 2006). However AJP started by focusing on the end products first. Their main focus was on improving visibility and infrastructure and not on the procedural requirements at the police stations and civil and criminal courts. The Technical Assistance Loan should have ideally started much ahead of the actual loan as its responsibility was to prepare a feasibility study and an implementation plan for the justice sector reformation in Pakistan. But in this case TA Loan team could not be in place in time. The disbursements for loan started ahead of activities in TA Loan and it was like proverbial putting the cart before the horse. It is interesting to note that this TA Loan was being provided at 1% interest rate and was considered the most important portion of AJP that was to serve as the nervous system for AJP exercise. However, AJP activities under TA Loan failed to kick off in time and failed to culminate in time. The sad part of the story is that the AJP team even failed to utilize the soft loan for its key activities and could only spend $8 million out of $20 million earmarked by ADB. There was a large scale criticism even inside ADB because of non-utilization of TA Loan and ADB decided to withdraw remaining $12 million on 30 June 16, 2008 closing the program activities altogether. Pakistans law minister wrote a letter to President ADB requesting to give
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extension to TA Loan so that ongoing activities can be finished but the request of the minister was not considered. TA loan was important because its objective was also to provide support to the actual $330 million program loan which is scheduled to end in June 2011. AJP left all the activities in the mid-way and decided to close all the initiatives pertaining to the revolution of revamping the justice sector in Pakistan. Role of ADB in AJP ADB termed their own performance in AJP as partly successful (PCR-ADB, 2009). The targets set by ADB were too good to be implemented. The benchmarks set by ADB only counted the number of activities undertaken and it did not take into account the results and effects of AJP interventions. International financial institutions are mainly concerned with the disbursement issue and even on this account the ADB team could not deliver. ADB did not made any objections for time constraint and lack of vision on desired targets at the time of signing of Loan Agreement. All along the period ranging from 2001 to 2008, the role of ADB has been intriguing. They continuously closed their eyes towards the incompetence of GOP and ADB consultants and kept on releasing the tranches required by the government without much hassle. But as soon as the money lent on market rate was dispersed, ADB became disinterested in continuing giving any leverage on the fund flowing from the ADF window. They disbursed the costly loan and suspended the soft loan and that is how they managed the resources under AJP. Role of an international organization in todays world must be to enable the disadvantaged groups to become more self-sufficient (McClymont,2000) but ADB could not come up to the expectations in the case of AJP. Role of Government Justice sector in developing countries is too much state centered and donor driven(Golub,2003).Basically the burden of responsibility of failing AJP falls on the shoulders of GOP and not on ADB. It was the responsibility to ensure effective measures for management of resources under this program which they started to empower the poor and vulnerable people. They were required to build a comprehensive plan to materialize the
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desires of the common people who have been victims of mal-administration of police and courts. It was them who had to see and decide as to what was required for overhauling the justice sector of Pakistan. But all this happened now where for the simple reason that GOP was only interested in getting fiscal space to finance their public sector development projects. There was no national plan in place to reform the justice sector in the country. The program was used to indirectly please the judges in all tiers of hierarchy without looking into the details as to what effects non-developmental expenditure under AJP will have on the countrys feeble economy. Governments should be made answerable under the law for faulty designing of projects and programs. Governments should also understand that budgetary support should not be understood as an easy way to secure funds and proper care should be taken in identifying the targets and activities financed under programs. Conclusion Lack of vision and profound strategy to introduce reforms in the justice sector of Pakistan resulted in failure of reforms under AJP. The program was introduced by General Pervez Musharraf who ironically himself had inflicted damage to the constitution by imposing Legal Framework Order (LFO) in 2000 and by suspending all the judges of high courts and Supreme Court in 2008. AJPs scheme of things did not touch countrys judicial system, rather focused on construction of infrastructure as if the country was in the stone age era and had no offices and courts altogether. The bureaucratic set up and infrastructure available in Pakistan has already been huge and mere focus on bricks and barracks was a sheer waste of money. The real policy areas needed to be worked out but all the recommendations of AJP failed because no consensus was developed before introducing them in the country. The issue of improving performance of police and judges could have given results if only monitoring mechanism had been bettered. One example that has been widely noticed by the people is the judicial efficiency of courts in Azad Kashmir; an autonomous territory in Pakistan. The Chief Justice of Azad Kashmir installed one fax machine in his office and asked all the judges under his jurisdiction to fax him the details of disposal of cases on daily basis. He personally monitored the disposal of cases and within six months all the territorys trial cases that had been pending
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since thirty years, were disposed of without the help of AJP. AJP with their $350 million could not even achieve this in Pakistan. Streamline of procedures in justice sector could have been achieved if there was an effort to change the mindset. But in the case of AJP, neither judicial officers nor the government and nor ADB showed their concern about poor and the vulnerable. Judicial officers thought that justice sector can only be improved if they are provided with renovated offices and new brand cars. The government was more concerned about budgetary support than in the justice sector reforms. And similarly ADB thought it a wonderful opportunity to introduce first ever justice sector reforms in the country by extending funds from their Ordinary Capital Resource Window. AJP was just a name given to a budgetary support program readily available from a donor to prop up the economy dwindling in the hands of a military ruler. The mechanism to ensure effective utilization of budgetary support remained absent during the process and ultimately resulted in failure of justice sector reforms in Pakistan. To conclude the argument, it would be suffice to say that a renewed anti-poverty agenda is needed to include the majority of world population in the system of rights and obligations that foster prosperity (UNDP,2008). It is therefore the responsibility of the respective governments to own their mistakes and prepare themselves for a better future for the coming generations. Ideally speaking governments commitment should be assessed before Banks agree to finance a judicial reform proposal (Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, 2000) and in the case of AJP it did not happen at all.
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References
Appendix - I
Fact Finding Mission Report, (2001), ADB Document. Manila, Phillipines. Report and Recommendation of the President (RRP),(2001). ADB Document. Manila Phillipines. Khan, M. S. (2005) The Denial of Justicethe Cost. Unpublished paper. Van Puymbroeck, R. V. (ed.) 2003. The World Bank Legal Review Sadiq.F.K (2001) The Way Forward: Access and Dispensation of Justice, Policy Paper. Sustainable Development Policy Institute, Islamabad, Pakistan. Abregu, M. 2001, 'Barricades or Obstacles: The Challenges of Accessible Justice', in R. V. Puymbroeck, (ed) Comprehensive Legal and Judicial Developments: Towards an Agenda for a Just and Equitable Society in the 21st Century', World Bank, Washington DC. Anderson, M. (2003), 'Access to Justice and Legal Process: Making Legal Institutions Responsive to Poor People in LDCs', comment paper on access to justice and legal process, paper for discussion at WDR Meeting,16-17 August 1999. Singh, A., ed.,(2009), Strengthening Governance Through Access to Justice, PHI Learning, New Dehli UNDP,(2008), Making the Law Work for Everyone, Report of the Commission on Legal Empowerment of the Poor, United Nations Development Programme, New York. Volume 1 Golub, S.,(2003), 'Beyond the Rule of Law Orthodoxy: The Legal Empowerment Alternative', Democracy and the Rule of Law Project, Rule of Law Series No. 41, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. McClymont, M. and Golub, S. (2000), 'Nonlawyers as Legal Resources for their Communities', in Many Roads to Justice, Ford Foundation. Rhudy, R, (2000), 'Expanding Access to Justice: Legal Aid Models for Latin America', chapter 2 in 'Justice Beyond Our Border, Inter-american Development Bank, Washington DC. Open Society Justice Initiative, (2004), 'Justice Initiatives: Legal Aid Reform and Access to Justice', February 2004 Issue, Open Society Justice Initiative, New York
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Hershkoff, H. and Hollander D. (2000), 'Rights into Action: Public Interest Litigation in the United States,' in M. McClymount and S. Golub (eds.) Many Roads to Justice, Ford Foundation. Dasgupta, M.,(2002), 'Social Action for Women? Public Interest Litigation in India's Supreme Court,' Law, Social Justice and Global Development Review, 2002, No. 1 Websites www.adb.org www.dailytimes.com.pk www.dawn.com www.nation.com
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It is widely believed that International Financial Institutions do not assess the commitment of client countries before extending heavy loans to them in the form of budgetary support. This results in failure of projects and programs that otherwise could have contributed in the social and economic uplift of the country as well as the people. Access to Justice Program in Pakistan is a recent example. The justice sector policy reform program was financed by Asian Development Bank in 2001. It failed to produce desired results and the burden of responsibility seems to fall on both the government as well as ADB. This paper takes into account the details of the donor driven program to deliberate on reasons that contributed in the failure of a high profile program in Pakistan.
Mukhtar Paras Shah

National Graduate Institute of Policy Studies, Tokyo
Why did Justice Plan fail? Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan
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Dedicated to the people of Pakistan who have recently struggled and sacrificed to ensure and upheld the independence of judiciary in Pakistan
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This paper was written as part of a research assignment conducted at National Graduate Institute of Policy Studies, Tokyo in Japan. The document was produced under the supervision of Prof. Ryokichi Hirono who has been contributing in the global development scene for the last fifty years in various capacities. The image used on the cover page has been retrieved from the Access to Justice Program Website. This publication may be reproduced free of charge in any format or medium for research and private study. This is subject to it being reproduced accurately and not in a misleading context. The material must be acknowledged as copyright and the title of the publication specified. Further information or free copies of this publication can be obtained by sending an e-mail to mukhtarparas@gmail.com;calling 0092 51 2274840; faxing a request at 0092 51 9213740 or by writing to the MPS, 14-Kyber Block,Gulshen e Jinnah,Islamabad, Pakistan.
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ABSTRACT
It is widely believed that International Financial Institutions do not assess the commitment of client countries before extending heavy loans to them in the form of budgetary support. This results in failure of projects and programs that otherwise would contribute in social and economic uplift of the country as well as the people. Access to Justice Program in Pakistan is a recent example. The justice sector policy reform program was financed by Asian Development Bank in 2001. It failed to produce desired results and the burden of responsibility seems to fall on both the government as well as ADB. This paper takes into account the details of the donor driven program to deliberate on reasons that contributed in the failure of a high profile program in Pakistan.
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Index
1. Introduction 2. Objectives of AJP 3. Main Components 4. Implementation Arrangements 5. Achievements 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.4 6. Failures 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 6.6 6.7 6.8 6.9 Problems in Implementation Focus on Construction Work Issues in Policy Making Judicial Independence Empowering the Poor Judicial Governance Citizen Police Relationship Failure in Extension of Loan Role of ADB & Government Infrastructure development in Khyber Infrastructure development in Baluchistan Infrastructure development in Punjab Procurement of Computers Revamping Police Training
Page No
06 07 09 10 10 10 10 11 11 12 14 15 15 16 17 18 19 21 23 24
7.
Conclusion
25 Appendix-I
References
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Introduction Government of Pakistan (GOP) and Asian Development Bank (ADB) signed the Loan Agreement for Access to Justice Program (AJP) on 20 December, 2001. Total outlay of the loan was $350 million and it was considered as the first ever intervention in the justice sector by any donor in Pakistan. The challenges in justice sector at that time included improving incentives for judiciary as well as creating linkages of reform agenda to poverty alleviation and benefits for the public. (RRP-ADB, 2001)The tasks had been huge and a high quality judiciary was considered essential for democracy, rule of law, sustainable development and poverty reduction. There had been continuous calls and recommendations by various forums to reform the justice sector in Pakistan but no serious effort was ever made to improve the efficiency of police and courts. (Pakistan Law Commission Report,1993) When General Pervez Musharraf came to power in 2000, he being the military ruler felt the need to take some popular decisions in order to establish his rule. In this background, he announced the devolution plan and ultimately promulgated the Local Government Ordinance 2001. Focus on improving service delivery at grass-root level naturally highlighted need to improve the condition and working of judicial system in the country. The new military ruler was also under immense pressure to raise funds for public sector projects as well as to increase the foreign exchange reserves in order to improve the countrys economic indicators. In this backdrop, ADB approved this high sounding budgetary support program for Pakistan. The swiftness, with which all details and designs of AJP were finalized, is intriguing. The appraisal mission reached Pakistan in September, 2001 and in four months a comprehensive plan was finalized. The ultimate beneficiaries of the justice sector reform program were supposed to be the common poor citizens who had no proper access to courts for redressal of their miseries. The law and judicial sector had been chronically under-funded impairing the quality of judicial services. This malaise manifested in a monstrous backlog existing
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throughout the courts with chronic delays in disposal of cases of five, ten, even twenty years. Other problems included shortages of judges and courthouses, inadequate facilities, and a dismal system of compensation, giving rise to complaints of endemic corruption. It was thus natural to expect that experts and consultants responsible for designing the program would suggest components and activities that guaranteed easy, immediate and reliable justice to the citizens. ADB consultants held meetings with the judicial officers and Bar Associations and consolidated their demands in the form of a project. However, no serious effort was made to contact public in general to get specific direction required for AJP reforms and no country wide survey was conducted for this multi-million dollar justice sector intervention. A close study of the relevant documents reveals that it is difficult to establish connections between AJPs aims and undertakings. (Fact Finding Mission Report,2001) The rock-bed for AJP was therefore, faulty. The program lacked a clear direction as well as strategy to implement the schemes that had no connections with the set objectives. AJP team tried to improve the justice sector in Pakistan through schemes designed by their experts but when targets are measured with the benchmark of disbursement of loan, no effective results can be expected. The AJP not only spent most of their money on irrelevant projects but even failed to spend whole of the loan amount. The program failed to close in time and was extended twice in order to assist the completion of schemes. Program that was seen as element of countrys poverty reduction strategy, ultimately ended up by spending money on construction of offices and purchase of vehicles. Story of AJP in Pakistan ended on 31 June 2008 but it definitely raised myriad questions about the responsibility of the stakeholders.
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Objectives of AJP Access to Justice Program sought to enhance citizen's access to justice by ensuring the provision of security and equal protection of law to citizens, securing and sustaining entitlements for reducing the vulnerability of the poor. Main Components The total funding made available by ADB for achievement of this goal was $350 million of which $20 million was specified for technical assistance, $25 million for Access to Justice Development Fund (AJDF) and $305 million for program activities. (Loan Agreement, 2001) The program involved a vast amount of foundational work, much of which was complex and inter-dependent on other reforms in other sectors such as police, ombudsman. An effort was undertaken to improve the management of the courts. It included reviewing the courts' information management system, measuring judicial performance, refining performance standards and improving compensation systems. Initiatives were made to introduce continuing on the-job training for judges to improve judicial competence. A training-of-trainers program on curriculum development and presentation skills was conducted for the teaching faculty of Federal Judicial Academy. Many judges and court administrators were sent to other common law jurisdictions including Britain, Canada, the United States, Australia and Singapore to study the 'do-able' role-models of how courts could reassume control of their day-to-day proceedings. In the second and third phase efforts were made to address civic matters and reach out to the users and beneficiaries at the grass-root level. (AJP Judicial Journal, 2009) In order to improve the quality of judicial policymaking, an important initiative focused on expanding role and mandate of the Law and Justice Commission to include responsibility for coordinating the administration of justice. Another major component was the pilot project in delay reduction, which is arguably the earliest visible success of the program. This included a plan to dispose of pending cases. Chief justices of respective high courts endorsed the extension of the pilot project to all courts throughout the country. Proposals were also developed to revamp the process serving establishment agency, and to improve court relations
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by introducing bench-bar and citizen-court liaison committees in every district. The delay reduction project intended to introduce courts' automation plan which could provide a blueprint for major improvements in information management capacity across the justice sector. The training-of-trainers program at the Federal Judicial Academy was also worked out for foundation of training capacity within the judiciary itself. Publication of the bench book to provide a quality-assured practical tool for judges with extended shelf-life was also realized under AJP. Revamping of courts statistical reporting system and the first publication of annual performance reports for the courts in the past thirty years was also part of the plan. The designers of the program rightly identified that judicial reforms should focus on two sectors i.e. Justice Sector and Police Sector. It is interesting to note that reforms areas identified by AJP were very much relevant to the requirements. The AJP pledged to overhaul policy making in the justice sector by introducing steps to strengthen judiciary and by empowering the poor and the vulnerable. There could be no difference of opinion when AJP vouchsafed to introduce a transparent police force that vowed to foster better police citizen relationship. In the light of these targets, access to inexpensive justice, people friendly police and empowerment of the vulnerable and women in justice sector were identified as the three main components of AJP. Implementation Arrangements Ministry of Law (MOL) was identified as the Implementing Agency for AJP and a Project Management Unit (PMU) was formed to implement the program. The Program Director (PD) of AJP was supposed to be a senior officer representing government side with the mandate to implement the program. (RRP-ADB, 2001) According to the instructions it was required that no government officer should be given dual charge for the post of PD and he would not be transferred from that position in order to ensure effective implementation of the program. The PD had a large team consisting of officers responsible to implement AJP. A team consisting of professionals and experts hired by ADB were also there to assist the government team. A National Steering Committee (NSC) stationed in MOL was responsible for oversight of the activities under AJP.
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Achievements Following is the list of activities undertaken by AJP during the implementation of this justice sector program. These activities have been described by ADB as their achievements. Infrastructure Development In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa A sum of Rs.3459 million was utilized for renovation and construction of 110 Court Rooms and 81 residences for judges in various districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. This construction work in the District Courts in NWFP for District & Session Judges and Civil Judges was commenced to improve the working conditions of the lower judiciary. This work also includes construction of more than 150 litigant sheds, Bakhshi Khanas and lavatories in various districts as public facilities for litigants and general public. Construction of six judicial Complexes and two bar rooms was also part of infrastructure improvement efforts being undertaken under the Program. The land for the judicial complexes in Hazara, Malakand, Southern Region and Haripur was acquired with the expenditure of Rs.64 million. (DAWN, 2008) Approximately Rs.400 million was spent on the establishment of new offices, barracks, and renovation of infrastructure in police and prison departments. It included schemes such as construction of 24 District Investigation Headquarters, Provision of Medico-legal wards, Criminal Records Office, Construction of District Jail Hangu, lock-ups, guard-rooms, Installation of Close Circuit Cameras in Prison Department and other projects concerning improvement in access to justice and better services for the people. Infrastructure Development in Baluchistan As part of the financial plan, Balochistan was entitled to a share of Rs 1,140.8 million as per NFC formulae, of which Rs 1056.0 million were set for budgetary allocation and Rs 1,008 million were released by AJP for works on uplift schemes in the province. In judiciary, total 18 schemes with an estimated cost of Rs 258 million were carried out. As part of this financial plan, 35 court rooms and buildings, 27 residences for judicial officers, 16 litigant
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sheds with amenities, a judicial complex and a bar room were constructed and money was spent on the purchase of land for these works. The Police Department was also given Rs. 282 million establishment of new police lines, barracks and residential complexes for the police officials. The Prisons Department had reserved Rs 247 million for the construction of 10 barracks, 12 death cells and 54 lodges for jail staffers. (Daily Times, 2008) Infrastructure Development in Punjab Punjab was projected as a leading province in implementation of the AJP. The achievements included work on 410 construction schemes under the Program. Punjab was extended Rs. 6132 million under AJP and around 342 schemes were carried out with this amount. As part of this plan, 178 Court rooms and buildings, 329 residences for judicial officers, 52 buildings with amenities for litigants, 21 judicial complexes, 2 bar rooms, land acquisition at 8 places and 8 projects for raising the capacity of departments with information technology equipment were installed. (Nation, 2008) The Police Department with its share of PKR.327 million focused on establishment of 14 new Police Lines, 19 barracks and 13 residential complexes, 128 death cells, 64 residences for jail staff, 17 lavatories and 2 high security jails. The Law Department Punjab also utilized Rs.94 million on various infrastructure schemes in the province. The Home department in the province also spent Rs.13 million on the centralized automated record management on child protection & data base for prisoners, crime situation, law and order. Procurement of Computers AJP procured 1461 computers for courts throughout the country under AJP. Hi-tech Computers were procured after an international bidding for the automation of judiciary throughout Pakistan. Out of this lot, 600 computers were distributed in all the courts in Punjab whereas 317 machines were installed in courts in Sind. Similarly the share of NWFP and Baluchistan for these digital equipments was 207 and 82 respectively. The computers were also given to 67 Bar Associations around the country to enable Bars to fulfill their mandated responsibilities regarding legal matters. (AJP Newsletter, 2008) The provision of computers
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and other IT accessories to judiciary at a large scale was seen as an effort to improve efficiency of the courts. Digitalization of courts as a result of this intervention was expected to result in free and easy access to information for the common people concerning justice sector. (AJP Annual Report, 2008) Revamping of Police Training System AJP had taken a resolve to revamp the police training system in Pakistan in line with reforms introduced under New Police Order 2002. Ministry of Law and National Police Academy reached an agreement to exploit capacity building provisions in AJP and entered the second generation reforms. It may be recalled that first phase of reforms focused on infrastructure development of the judiciary and in the second phase focus was to target areas concerning police, prisons and professional training institutes in order to build linkages with them and to promote public grievance redress mechanism. (Khan,2005) In order to reach the objectives, AJP decided to strengthen National Police Academy by providing them with computers and forensic facility. Under this program 78 training modules were also prepared for police officers by a Police Reforms Specialist. Public Awareness AJP spend millions of rupees on publishing a varied range of simplified material on legal matters. The 227 booklets printed were meant for dissemination among the public and users of justice sector. The documents focused on themes of legal education and empowerment of the common people covering topics relevant to justice sector problems faced by the public in day to day life. AJP also published and disseminated 25 guidelines for the people on issues such as; how to acquire a National I D Card; how to register an FIR; how to register complaint against highhandedness of police officials; laws about consumer rights; legal cover for the rights of bonded labor and the like. (AJP Newsletter,2008)These booklets were written in Urdu and effort was made to reach out to the common people and impart the legal information through simplified messages. The material was disseminated at large scale through District
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Councils, Tehsil Councils, Union Councils, libraries and Public Information Kiosks established at District Courts. The emphasis of this public awareness campaign was also on newly introduced police reforms. Some attractive and informative posters were designed for people at the grassroots level so that they could know about their rights in the civic and administrative system of the government. These posters intended to educate the masses about information and procedures for grievance redress under New Police Order such as Role of District Public Safety Commission, Citizen Police Liaison Committee and mechanism of accountability of Police. Mr.Azhar Hasan Nadeem, Inspector General of Police in Punjab had directed to display these posters for public viewing in the Police Stations so that visitors may acquire information about their rights and mechanism of accountability under Police Reforms. Consumer Courts Eight Consumers Courts were established in Punjab that was headed by District and Session Judges. These courts established under the justice sector reform agenda were destined to play positive and effective role in extending maximum relief to the public. The concept of setting up consumer courts was to discourage the sub-standard articles of daily use and defective services to the masses. Access to Information AJP aimed at empowering the citizens to get access to information in the light of Freedom of Information Ordinance 2002. AJP understood that citizens inability to acquire timely and accurate information hinders their claim to fundamental entitlements. AJP launched a
nationwide public campaign on right to freedom of information. This campaign aimed at educating public to use their right to obtain information held by the public authorities. AJPs constant advocacy and lobbying with provincial governments and holding of activities with concerned stakeholders moved the provincial governments to enact Freedom of Information law. The Government of Balochistan enacted Freedom of Information Act 2005. This was followed by promulgation of Freedom of Information Ordinance by Governor of Sindh. Later
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Provincial Assembly, Sindh enacted the Ordinance into an Act in 2006. The Provinces of Punjab and NWFP did not take part in this imperative legislation. The AJP provided technical assistance in number of complementary actions to translate this policy initiative into effective implementation to strengthen right to access to information. Five capacity building workshops one in Islamabad and four in provinces were held. The participants include government officials of different departments, judicial officers, representative from civil society organizations, journalists, lawyers, political activists, bank officers, common people and students from universities and colleges. It also tried to dispel official mindset used to hide public information by labeling it as classified, secret and confidential. To further strengthen institutional mechanism computers were provided to the courts along with designing and installation of information management system to facilitate litigants as well legal community to take information about exact status of their cases. Capacity Building Capacity building has been the most misleading aspect of project implementation. It is worth mentioning that Rs.77 million were spent in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province for the capacity building of staff in courts of Additional and Session Judges and Rs.58 million were earmarked for the up-gradation and improvement of Civil Courts in the Province. Under these schemes, around 57 Additional Session Judges, 50 Civil Judges and more than 1242 sub-ordinate staff was recruited. These courts have also been provided with computers and other necessities to run the day to day affairs effectively. Failures Numerous local factors count much when a particular model of governance is being developed and applied in a country (Rhudy,2000). In the case of AJP local realities were neither studied thoroughly and nor were given a place in the strategy map. It resulted into a long list of disappointments during the implementation of AJP reforms. Following is a discussion summarizing some of the key problematic areas that surfaced during the AJP experience in Pakistan.
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Problems with Implementation Arrangements Ministry of Law being the IA was responsible for results in line with the set targets. However neither Minister for Law nor Secretary Law had enough time to dig deep into the details of implementation of AJP. In eight years it was only once that Minister for Law chaired a meeting on AJP. The Steering Committee could not meet regularly and usually its meeting was called only in emergency matters. Most of the Steering Committee meetings were held in 2005 and 2006 when AJP had been flagged as at risk program by the donors. In the initial phase of implementation the approval of Judicial Commission comprising of Supreme Court Judges gave approval for schemes being funded from Asian Development Fund Sources. Those judges either had no time to dispose off cases in time or were very conservative and careful in giving approvals. The PD was frequently changed and transferred from AJP and there were occasions when AJP had no boss for longer periods. The officers appointed in AJP from government side were incompetent and ineffective as they lacked competency. The ADB consultants were more concerned in disbursement of loan money and they had not made an effort to link the activities with set targets of AJP. The implementation arrangements for AJP were not in line with the requirements of an ambitious program. The program started in 2001 and for five long years no body realized that AJP needed some arrangements to look after the implementation of schemes in the respective provinces. It was only in 2005 that Provincial Management Units of AJP were introduced in the country but it was too late. The damage has already been done. Focus on Construction Work AJP received wide scale criticism on its focus on infrastructure development such as residences for judges and offices. Infrastructure already available might not have been enough but it was there. The analysts think that focus would have been on practical aspects of governance in spite of on construction work which has no relation with the plight of the poor. Same number of districts had same number of offices and courts even before AJP. It was argued by the experts that Justice is not in the bricks and stones but in the mindset and just
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sector reforms should have tried to change the perceptions and behavior of the stakeholders like police and judges towards the beneficiaries of judicial system. The equipment was also provided to digitalize major libraries in justice sector departments such as Law Department, Home Departments and Offices of the Ombudsman. The idea was to automate the police and justice sector by introducing automation of registration of Firs and to link the proceeding of court with computers. But this brilliant idea could not be translated into reality and expensive computers could only be used as typing machines. Issues in Policy Making AJP boasts of introducing amendments in Law Commission Ordinance 1979 as the most visible achievement on policy making front. The ordinance only expanded the mandate and composition of Law and Justice Commission of Pakistan by including Chief Justice of Pakistan in it. AJP considers the introduction of National Judicial Policy Making Committee (NJPMC) as its policy achievement. But ironically the inclusion of CJP in NJPMC was the most important factor that resulted in slow progress of development schemes under AJP. Target of AJP to revamp the justice sector policy was well set but tools employed and activities undertaken to reach the target were highly controversial. AJP in fact miserably failed in restructuring the justice sector in Pakistan for improving the service delivery for the poor and vulnerable. Policy initiatives such as promulgation of ordinances about access to information and dissemination of information about establishment of consumer courts were projected as policy achievements. But one feels like asking as to what were the changes in policy matters pertaining to procedures at courts and police stations that were introduced by AJP during the implementation period of eight years. Were any structural changes introduced for registration of First Information Reports (FIRs) at the police stations? Was access to courts at the grass-root level made better for the poor and vulnerable? What mechanism was adopted by AJP to ensure inexpensive justice for the disadvantageous groups in the light of its self-set targets? The answer is a big NO. None of the areas were touched and no effort was made under AJP to change the structure and improve the efficiency of justice sector in Pakistan.
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Judicial Independence ADBs Completion Report about AJP states that good progress was made to ensure independence of judiciary in Pakistan. The Project Completion Report (PCR, 2010) further explains that budgetary allocations for the federal level and the provincial levels were increased for the purpose. At federal level the budget for SC was increased from Rs.466 million in 2001 to Rs.926 million in 2008. Similarly provincial budgets were given an increase by 18%. Is increasing finances a guarantee for an independent judiciary? Was this a well worked out target? The ADB report does not however explains that this increase expenditure was spent on enhanced salaries of the judges and on purchase of vehicles. This strengthened and independent judiciary was sent home by General Pervez Musharraf in 2008 by sheer use of force and there was no mechanism in place to safeguard the secure presence of justice system in the political economy of the country. Even at the lower level simple separation of judiciary from executive was termed as the independence of judiciary which was in fact wrong. The separation of judiciary from the executive may be a step in the right direction but no institutional arrangements were suggested and introduced by AJP to handle the pressure faced by the lower courts. Simple flow of funds for schemes that had no relevance with the fate of the poor could not help at all. Provision of Inexpensive Justice? It is interesting to note the way AJP connects its achievements with the empowerment of poor. ADB thinks that their effort resulted in clearance of backlog of cases all around the country. They quote their own generated reports and say that as a result of case management reforms, judges disposed of around 25% more cases than before and this efficiency of courts was termed as equivalent to 0.5% growth in GDP. ADB seems to be of the view that this fiscal benefit has automatically been passed on to the poor and the vulnerable as they explain this efficiency under their target of ensuring inexpensive justice. According to studies (Armytage, 2003) CJP Mr.Iftikhar Chaudahry himself had been the cause of clearance of backlog of 80000 cases who had put all the judges in the country on their toes by increasing
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monitoring. AJPs claim to link it with provision of inexpensive justice seems interesting and speaks volumes of how AJP was handled by its team of professionals. ADBs AJP had introduced some legislative changes in filing of habeas corpus applications and amendments in Civil Procedure Code of 1908. Although the initiatives are welcome but ADBs claim that these changes resulted in provision of better access for the vulnerable needed to be supported by some statistics. Up till this time no study has been undertaken either by GOP or by ADB to testify the implications of the amendments made under AJP in the name improved access to justice system. The most propagated arrangement for inexpensive justice was the introduction of Musalihat Anjumun (MA) that was to be operationalized at Union Council level. This was an alternate arrangement for dispute resolution for the people but ADB itself admits that MAs could not be operationalized as envisioned under AJP. Empowering the Poor and Vulnerable It is recognized that inability to access to justice is the most obvious sign of inequality in society. (Abregu,2001) AJP tried to empower the poor and vulnerable by publishing booklets and pamphlets on various legal and procedural matters pertaining to courts and police. In a country where literacy rate for men is 65% whereas only 45% of women are literate, the decision to publish information booklets required qualification. Most important of all, it needed a justification whether it would really empower the major population of the country or not who are illiterate and have no access to published materials. More sad part of the story is that all the list of publications for empowering the people were published only in the last year of AJP implementation only to meet the targets set as exercise. The books and pamphlets were bundled in big bags and posted to District Coordination Officers all over Pakistan for circulation in the government agencies and offices. They never reached those for whom they were published i.e. the poor and the vulnerable. People waiting on the broken wooden benches in the police station courtyards were waiting for perhaps something else that AJP could not capture in their scheme of things.
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Judicial Governance The institutional obstacles in legal and judicial system of the developing countries have been the major cause of poor governance. (Anderson, 2003) When AJP talked about improving judicial governance, people at the lower strata of life thought that now measure would be taken to ensure that no official will extort money from the litigants and complainants and that only a simple application would set the court system to process his request for grievance redressal . However to our astonishment, activities undertaken by ADB in the name of judicial governance were quite different. Under this head, the judicial officers were offered three times rise in salaries and allowances and this exercise was unanimously agreed and adopted by GOP and ADB both. While judges qualified for new residences, renovated offices, new cars and enhanced salaries, police continued to extort money from the seekers of justice. Human Resource Development ADB states that there biggest achievement in order to develop the human resources under AJP was to help open a Law School at Lahore University of Management Science (LUMS).The said university is a leading private sector university where millionaire students can only afford to get admission and study. Similarly, development of some manuals and courses was undertaken for the Federal Judicial Academy (FJA) but unfortunately those manuals could not get clearance from the judges until the closure of AJP. Human resource development at FJA could therefore only be restricted to investment in renovation of office, building and library. ADBs project documents are silent about any component that focused on the training of the trainers at FJA. Ensuring Accountability in Police AJPs endeavor was to ensure an independent, accountable transparent and professional police. It is acknowledged by the analysts that adoption of Police Order 2002 by GOP was the landmark decision that could have transformed the working of police department in favor of the people. However one very fundamental mistake has already been done by the National Reconstruction Bureau (NRB) in this regard. Firstly, they tried to take complete inspiration
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from the British model and did not take into account the local expediencies and secondly they tried to implement the new Police Order through the Police Officers themselves who knew the tricks to maneuver the rules and provisions in their favor. The police officers had already become all the more powerful after the dissolution of the institution of Deputy Commissioner in the district. The vague and intricate schematization of oversight offered in Police Order 2002 made police department independent but in no way accountable. AJP exclaims that establishment of Public Safety Commissions (PSCs) at federal, provincial and district level represented by the public representatives was a great success. It would have been a huge achievement if these oversight bodies had actually become operational. Almost in all the provinces there were disagreements on the selection of members of PSCs and complaints about non-serious attitude of police officers towards the observations of PSCs became a common phenomenon. At national level National Public Safety Commission could not even become operational. The dismal performance of PSCs has been a sad story in the era of decentralization when AJP was given the responsibility to make police a people friendly department. Departments do not change cultures and mindset under the influence of ordinances and AJP without realizing the ground realities continued to measure their performance in terms of findings of seminars and workshops. Independent Prosecution According to the legislation under Police Order 2002, independent prosecution department was established to ensure transparent trials. Previously investigation and prosecution used to be handled by the same officers in police stations. The separation of both the departments must have been a brilliant idea but it did not work in Pakistan well at least till the closure of AJP. There were huge differences among the provinces over the implementation of this Police Order and even differences among the police officials continuously surfaced during the period. A workshop of police officers conducted in Faisalabad in June 2008 concluded that separation has created more confusion among the beneficiaries as well as the police officers. It was pointed out that separation of the two branches has created disconnect between the officers working under the same roof resulting in communication gaps.
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Creation of Independent Complaint Authority The right to get legal protection is the test of governments commitment to rights of the people (Harshcoff & Hollander, 2000) Establishment of independent complaint authorities was another ideal situation visualized by AJP without taking into account the ground realities. The target set by AJP was only to announce the establishment of complaint authorities but evaluation of the application of this philosophy was entrusted to no one. Interestingly the complaint authorities were merged in Public Safety Commissions which were already ineffective. The process of making a complaint was simple; an application on a plain paper against any police officer could initiate actions against him. But did it work? Did the head of public safety commissions ever initiated cases against police officers on general complaints? The answer is in negative. The weak pubic representatives lacked the sinews to challenge the authority and power of the police officers even if there was a complaint against them. The chairman of the PSC could only request the District Police Officer to initiate action against the offender police officials but nothing more than this. Under the law DPO was not obliged to ensure implementation on the recommendation of the Chairman of PSC. Even the statistics show that entirely insignificant number of complaints was registered against the police during this time and this happened in the country which is known as the police state. In this backdrop, it is unjustified on the part of AJP to claim the creation of independent complaint authority as one of their landmark achievements. Fostering better Police Citizen Relationship ADB had tied the release of third tranche of AJP loan amounting to $9,764,808,000 with governments efforts to foster Police-Citizen relationship. AJPs main plan revolved around Citizen Police Liaison Committees(CPLCs) and main inspiration was taken from the successful experience of Karachis City Police Liaison Committee that has been delivering since long and that too independent of any effort connected with AJP. GOP failed to muster up enough support for replication of CPLCs in all the districts of the country. They in fact categorically refused to legislate on this matter of high importance. Interesting part of the story is that ADB accepted the logic forwarded by GOP that legislation on CPLCs cannot be
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made. In order to fulfill the condition a Media and Communication Specialist was hired for only two months and that too only two months before the closing the loan date just to register that efforts to improve citizen police relationship were being done by AJP. As a result of this achievement, ADB released the third tranche of loan, badly needed by the government that faced financial constraints at that time. Raising Human Rights Awareness Legal empowerment is giving the people relevant skills and awareness to access institutions for grievance redress (Singh, 2009). AJPs list of achievement vaunts about the role they played in raising human rights awareness during the implementation of program. Details on the activities undertaken for this awareness campaign are nowhere to be seen in ADBs Project Completion Report. According to an inside information, no exclusive activities were designed or implemented by ADB or even GOP under the umbrella of AJP. In fact, material such as posters, booklets and pamphlets designed by the media and communication specialist is being referred under various topics as cross-cutting thematic activity. ADB used this two month activity to show achievement in connection with themes such as fostering citizenpolice relationship, raising human rights awareness and even gender empowerment. The reality is the AJP only produced two posters projecting the importance of women police in society. This published material was supposed to be circulated among all police stations and union councils for display. According to the sources, those pamphlets, booklets and posters were never circulated by AJP till the closure of the loan in 2008. Gender empowerment A good combination of Law, social justice and development can only help improve the condition of women in the developing countries (Dasgupta,2002). While commenting on their achievements on the issue of gender empowerment, AJP states that during the period of implementation of program, the number of share of women judges in the lower courts increased from 3.67% to 5.76% in the Punjab, from 5.88% to 11.90% in Balochistan, from 7.61% to 13.72% in NWFP, and from 7.30% to 15.45% in Sindh. They also add that five
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women police stations were set and a considerable number of women were recruited as traffic wardens in the light of this initiative. AJP, however is silent as to what statistical impact these initiatives had on empowering the common women in the society. Some empirical evidence should have suggested the connection between AJP initiative on recruiting women judges and women traffic police and social development indicators pertaining to crime and harassment of women in the society. It is not difficult to understand that ADB considered the activities undertaken by their consultants as the benchmarks and in real no change actually took place in society as a result of this multi-million dollar justice sector program. (Yasin and Shah, 2004) Failure in extension of TA Loan The TA Loan for AJP could have played a very important role in implementation of the whole justice sector reform. But lack of vision, strategy and leadership rendered the program useless. It has been argued by the experts that good practice should focus on the needs of the people at the beginning of the criminal justice system (Penal Reform International, 2006). However AJP started by focusing on the end products first. Their main focus was on improving visibility and infrastructure and not on the procedural requirements at the police stations and civil and criminal courts. The Technical Assistance Loan should have ideally started much ahead of the actual loan as its responsibility was to prepare a feasibility study and an implementation plan for the justice sector reformation in Pakistan. But in this case TA Loan team could not be in place in time. The disbursements for loan started ahead of activities in TA Loan and it was like proverbial putting the cart before the horse. It is interesting to note that this TA Loan was being provided at 1% interest rate and was considered the most important portion of AJP that was to serve as the nervous system for AJP exercise. However, AJP activities under TA Loan failed to kick off in time and failed to culminate in time. The sad part of the story is that the AJP team even failed to utilize the soft loan for its key activities and could only spend $8 million out of $20 million earmarked by ADB. There was a large scale criticism even inside ADB because of non-utilization of TA Loan and ADB decided to withdraw remaining $12 million on 30 June 16, 2008 closing the program activities altogether. Pakistans law minister wrote a letter to President ADB requesting to give
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extension to TA Loan so that ongoing activities can be finished but the request of the minister was not considered. TA loan was important because its objective was also to provide support to the actual $330 million program loan which is scheduled to end in June 2011. AJP left all the activities in the mid-way and decided to close all the initiatives pertaining to the revolution of revamping the justice sector in Pakistan. Role of ADB in AJP ADB termed their own performance in AJP as partly successful (PCR-ADB, 2009). The targets set by ADB were too good to be implemented. The benchmarks set by ADB only counted the number of activities undertaken and it did not take into account the results and effects of AJP interventions. International financial institutions are mainly concerned with the disbursement issue and even on this account the ADB team could not deliver. ADB did not made any objections for time constraint and lack of vision on desired targets at the time of signing of Loan Agreement. All along the period ranging from 2001 to 2008, the role of ADB has been intriguing. They continuously closed their eyes towards the incompetence of GOP and ADB consultants and kept on releasing the tranches required by the government without much hassle. But as soon as the money lent on market rate was dispersed, ADB became disinterested in continuing giving any leverage on the fund flowing from the ADF window. They disbursed the costly loan and suspended the soft loan and that is how they managed the resources under AJP. Role of an international organization in todays world must be to enable the disadvantaged groups to become more self-sufficient (McClymont,2000) but ADB could not come up to the expectations in the case of AJP. Role of Government Justice sector in developing countries is too much state centered and donor driven(Golub,2003).Basically the burden of responsibility of failing AJP falls on the shoulders of GOP and not on ADB. It was the responsibility to ensure effective measures for management of resources under this program which they started to empower the poor and vulnerable people. They were required to build a comprehensive plan to materialize the
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desires of the common people who have been victims of mal-administration of police and courts. It was them who had to see and decide as to what was required for overhauling the justice sector of Pakistan. But all this happened now where for the simple reason that GOP was only interested in getting fiscal space to finance their public sector development projects. There was no national plan in place to reform the justice sector in the country. The program was used to indirectly please the judges in all tiers of hierarchy without looking into the details as to what effects non-developmental expenditure under AJP will have on the countrys feeble economy. Governments should be made answerable under the law for faulty designing of projects and programs. Governments should also understand that budgetary support should not be understood as an easy way to secure funds and proper care should be taken in identifying the targets and activities financed under programs. Conclusion Lack of vision and profound strategy to introduce reforms in the justice sector of Pakistan resulted in failure of reforms under AJP. The program was introduced by General Pervez Musharraf who ironically himself had inflicted damage to the constitution by imposing Legal Framework Order (LFO) in 2000 and by suspending all the judges of high courts and Supreme Court in 2008. AJPs scheme of things did not touch countrys judicial system, rather focused on construction of infrastructure as if the country was in the stone age era and had no offices and courts altogether. The bureaucratic set up and infrastructure available in Pakistan has already been huge and mere focus on bricks and barracks was a sheer waste of money. The real policy areas needed to be worked out but all the recommendations of AJP failed because no consensus was developed before introducing them in the country. The issue of improving performance of police and judges could have given results if only monitoring mechanism had been bettered. One example that has been widely noticed by the people is the judicial efficiency of courts in Azad Kashmir; an autonomous territory in Pakistan. The Chief Justice of Azad Kashmir installed one fax machine in his office and asked all the judges under his jurisdiction to fax him the details of disposal of cases on daily basis. He personally monitored the disposal of cases and within six months all the territorys trial cases that had been pending
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since thirty years, were disposed of without the help of AJP. AJP with their $350 million could not even achieve this in Pakistan. Streamline of procedures in justice sector could have been achieved if there was an effort to change the mindset. But in the case of AJP, neither judicial officers nor the government and nor ADB showed their concern about poor and the vulnerable. Judicial officers thought that justice sector can only be improved if they are provided with renovated offices and new brand cars. The government was more concerned about budgetary support than in the justice sector reforms. And similarly ADB thought it a wonderful opportunity to introduce first ever justice sector reforms in the country by extending funds from their Ordinary Capital Resource Window. AJP was just a name given to a budgetary support program readily available from a donor to prop up the economy dwindling in the hands of a military ruler. The mechanism to ensure effective utilization of budgetary support remained absent during the process and ultimately resulted in failure of justice sector reforms in Pakistan. To conclude the argument, it would be suffice to say that a renewed anti-poverty agenda is needed to include the majority of world population in the system of rights and obligations that foster prosperity (UNDP,2008). It is therefore the responsibility of the respective governments to own their mistakes and prepare themselves for a better future for the coming generations. Ideally speaking governments commitment should be assessed before Banks agree to finance a judicial reform proposal (Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, 2000) and in the case of AJP it did not happen at all.
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References
Appendix - I
Fact Finding Mission Report, (2001), ADB Document. Manila, Phillipines. Report and Recommendation of the President (RRP),(2001). ADB Document. Manila Phillipines. Khan, M. S. (2005) The Denial of Justicethe Cost. Unpublished paper. Van Puymbroeck, R. V. (ed.) 2003. The World Bank Legal Review Sadiq.F.K (2001) The Way Forward: Access and Dispensation of Justice, Policy Paper. Sustainable Development Policy Institute, Islamabad, Pakistan. Abregu, M. 2001, 'Barricades or Obstacles: The Challenges of Accessible Justice', in R. V. Puymbroeck, (ed) Comprehensive Legal and Judicial Developments: Towards an Agenda for a Just and Equitable Society in the 21st Century', World Bank, Washington DC. Anderson, M. (2003), 'Access to Justice and Legal Process: Making Legal Institutions Responsive to Poor People in LDCs', comment paper on access to justice and legal process, paper for discussion at WDR Meeting,16-17 August 1999. Singh, A., ed.,(2009), Strengthening Governance Through Access to Justice, PHI Learning, New Dehli UNDP,(2008), Making the Law Work for Everyone, Report of the Commission on Legal Empowerment of the Poor, United Nations Development Programme, New York. Volume 1 Golub, S.,(2003), 'Beyond the Rule of Law Orthodoxy: The Legal Empowerment Alternative', Democracy and the Rule of Law Project, Rule of Law Series No. 41, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. McClymont, M. and Golub, S. (2000), 'Nonlawyers as Legal Resources for their Communities', in Many Roads to Justice, Ford Foundation. Rhudy, R, (2000), 'Expanding Access to Justice: Legal Aid Models for Latin America', chapter 2 in 'Justice Beyond Our Border, Inter-american Development Bank, Washington DC. Open Society Justice Initiative, (2004), 'Justice Initiatives: Legal Aid Reform and Access to Justice', February 2004 Issue, Open Society Justice Initiative, New York
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Hershkoff, H. and Hollander D. (2000), 'Rights into Action: Public Interest Litigation in the United States,' in M. McClymount and S. Golub (eds.) Many Roads to Justice, Ford Foundation. Dasgupta, M.,(2002), 'Social Action for Women? Public Interest Litigation in India's Supreme Court,' Law, Social Justice and Global Development Review, 2002, No. 1 Websites www.adb.org www.dailytimes.com.pk www.dawn.com www.nation.com
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It is widely believed that International Financial Institutions do not assess the commitment of client countries before extending heavy loans to them in the form of budgetary support. This results in failure of projects and programs that otherwise could have contributed in the social and economic uplift of the country as well as the people. Access to Justice Program in Pakistan is a recent example. The justice sector policy reform program was financed by Asian Development Bank in 2001. It failed to produce desired results and the burden of responsibility seems to fall on both the government as well as ADB. This paper takes into account the details of the donor driven program to deliberate on reasons that contributed in the failure of a high profile program in Pakistan.

Why Did Access To Justice Program Fail in Pakistan?

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Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Why did Justice Plan fail? Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan

Mukhtar Paras Shah

Why did Justice Plan fail; Story of an ADB intervention in Pakistan