Lord Acton’s adage should read that power corrupts, but the absence of power corrupts absolutely. Wealth has become a step up in the ladder to power. Tainted wealth is the express lift to the top.
Whereas some countries are free of natural diseases like polio or smallpox, there is yet to be one declared free of corruption. It is like Covid, a man-made virus.
Pakistan has amended its present Constitution 27 times. It needs to amend the motto bequeathed by our founder. To Unity, Faith and Discipline should be added a fourth - Corruption. It is no longer a vice. It is an imperative, a prerequisite to gain power and the beneficial consequence of exercising it.
According to Transparency International, Pakistan can be found on its scale of corruption somewhere between Ukraine and Afghanistan. These countries, in the words of the French essayist J. Giradoux, ‘are like fruit - the worms are always inside’.
Recently, Andriy Yermak (Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s trusted chief of staff) has been accused of corruption, and removed. The corruption of Zelensky’s predecessors - presidents Kuchma (1994-2005) and Yushchenko (2005-2010) caused the U.S. to label Ukraine as ‘a kleptocracy’.
Despite the ongoing war with Russia (or because of it), Ukraine continues to benefit from the indulgent largesse of the U.S., the EU and the IMF. Since 2014, the U.S. has provided $114 billion, the EU and 27 Member States made available $197 billion, and in November 2025, the IMF and Ukraine reached a deal on a four-year Extended Fund Facility (EFF) worth approximately $8.2 billion.
Take Afghanistan. According to reports, in 2010, Afghan president Hamid Karzai declared an official salary of $525, less than $20,000 in the bank and no investment in land. By 2025, his assets exceeded $25 million. His brother Mahmood Karzai began with a modest $12 million in 2010. He is now worth $900 million. Close behind is Fahim Hashimy ($750 million) who began as an interpreter for U.S. forces.
Until the IMF suspended aid to Afghanistan following the Taliban takeover in 2021, it had provided US$370 million Extended Credit Facility (ECF) and approximately US$220 million in emergency assistance. Until the Taliban return Bagram air base and other assets to the U.S., the Taliban might like to tap the Karzai brothers and Hashimy to meet their national deficit.
A condition of the IMF’s latest support to Ukraine expects it to implement ‘a set of fiscal and monetary policies […] maintaining macroeconomic stability, restoring debt sustainability and external viability, tackling corruption (italics added), and improving governance’.
Its recent Diagnostic Report on Governance and Corruption on Pakistan admits that ‘Pakistan’s governance indicators consistently rank poorly, reflecting weaknesses in controlling corruption, enforcing contracts, and protecting property rights’. And yet the IMF entertains the entreaties of Pakistani governments of every hue (right, left and khaki) for bailouts. Since 1958, Pakistan has applied to the IMF 25 times.
In dealing with chronic borrowers like Pakistan, the IMF uses the carrot and stick approach, except that its carrot is always longer than its stick. Its exhortation ‘to tackle corruption’ are akin to a governess’s admonitions.
The Report speaks without naming them of ‘privileged actors’ extracting ‘undue benefits’. With this in mind, Pakistani voters in the next general election due in 2029 might like to compare declaration of assets by their leaders.
They should access the Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN). Its website discloses the self-declared net worth of our legislators since 2002, as submitted to the Election Commission of Pakistan. According to FAFEN, President Asif Ali Zardari’s net worth increased from Rs. 671 m. (2017-18) to Rs. 2.03 bn. in 2024. Over the same period, his son Bilawal’s net worth crept from Rs. 1.54 bn. to Rs. 1.99 bn.
Punjab’s CM Maryam Nawaz Sharif declared her net worth at Rs. 838 million. By contrast her uncle PM Shehbaz Sharif’s net worth decreased from Rs. 306m. in 2017-18 to Rs. 73 million in 2024. Imran Khan’s net worth has oscillated from Rs. 55 m. (2002-3) to a high of Rs. 197 m. (2019-20).
Politicians do not expect to spend their greying years in jail. Certainly the former French president Nicolas Sarkozy had not planned to, but then as the saying goes, old sins have long shadows. His involvement as Budget Minister in the sale of three Agosta-class submarines worth $900 m. to us in the 1990s has been one of the charges against him.
The Roman senator Tacitus warned history: ‘The more corrupt the state, the more numerous its laws’. Are laws (as the IMF advises) sufficient to prevent corruption? Both Ukraine and Pakistan have National Accountability Bureaus. Laws and NABs clearly are not the curative for this man-made virus.
F. S. AIJAZUDDIN
[DAWN, 4 Dec. 2025] |
