In 2001, when the Pervez Musharraf-led government in Pakistan actively passed the local government act of 2001, International non-Governmental Organisations (INGOs) started making inroads in Pakistan due to Musharraf’s new local government agenda and the post 9/11 situation. They got free certificates without checking their eligibility and other registration requirements.
They came by the dozens in the name of social development. They were registered in their own countries and had opened branches in Pakistan and started working directly with the communities.
Now the question is: Why are these INGOs directly working with the communities? Why are they not outsourcing their activities to local NGOs and community-based organisations? When the concept of international NGOs and donors was introduced in Pakitan, everybody said that they would not get directly involved with the communities, but outsource their activities to locally-based NGOs. After the 2005 earthquake and 2010 flood disaster, these international NGOs and donors started hiring staff directly and opened their field offices at the union, tehsil [administrative division] and district levels. Save the Children has hundreds of such field offices and direct hiring practices without even following normal procedures of local hiring.
Right now the government has bowed its head before international pressure and ordered six months’ permit to international NGOs. What new regulations will the government decide for their registration in Pakistan? I would like to suggest that the government not rely on its own Interior Ministry or Economic Affairs Division but use the experts of Pakistani NGOs, the National Rural Support Programme and national donors to frame permanant laws. The government should ask international NGOs to outsource at least 90 per cent of their activities to locally based NGOs and prefer local hiring as per the need of the project and community.
The most important thing is that Pakistan needs the support of international donors and their parent organisations due to its economic and social indicators. Until and unless the Pakistani government does not reach better human rights and development indicators, Pakistan will need the support of international donors. We are far away from education, health, nutrition, livelihood, food and human rights issues.
Pakistan has missed almost all the United Nations Millennium Development Goal targets. The government should not stop the work of international NGOs but force them to outsource their activities to locally-based NGOs. If the government is serious about the solution of the basic human rights of Pakistanis, then a day will come when Pakistan asks all the donors and international NGOs topack their bags because Pakistan has achieved all its targets.
— The reader is a development consultant based in Karachi, Pakistan
