Ethics Commissioner

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his family accepted an invitation from Prince Karim Aga Khan to vacation over the Christmas holidays in December 2016 on his private resort in the Bahamas.  In addition, Prime Minister Trudeau admitted that he was transported there by the Aga Khan’s private helicopter.

Trudeau claimed that he was spending time with an old friend but the then Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner of Canada (Ethics Commissioner) Mary Dawson, ultimately found the vacation violated four sections of the Conflict of Interest Act. 

The Canadian ethics commissioner slated PM Trudeau for failing to contemplate the potential ethical pitfalls of accepting a free vacation to the private island when the federal government has dealings with Aga Khan’s foundation. 

This is in contrast to then Chief Minister Punjab and current Opposition Leader in the National Assembly Shehbaz Sharif suddenly flying to Saudi Arabia on December 27, 2017 on a jet owned by a Saudi Prince. Without any prior notice to any authority or institution, CM Punjab hopped on a private jet and did not state the purpose and objectives of the meeting.  Was his trip ethical or not? The public that he served has a right to know but there appears that there is no mechanism to compel him or the prime minister or cabinet minister to disclose.

Conflicts of interest impede the basic ethical principle of fairness, treating everyone the same. An elected representative or public officeholder should not take unfair advantage of his or her position by voting or deciding on a matter that could benefit them.

A conflict of interest undermines trust in the political system. They make the public lose confidence in the integrity of the government’s decision-making processes. An elected representative and public office holder’s primary mandate is to serve the public and not vested private interests. 

We need to have a mechanism and watchdog similar to Canada and establish an independent Officer of Parliament on Conflict of Interest and Ethics, commonly referred to as an Ethics Commissioner. The parliament needs to passing legislation to establish the Office of the Ethics Commissioner as an Officer of Parliament to reports directly to Parliament and not the government.

The president will appoint the Ethics Commissioner after consultation with the leader of opposition parties in the National Assembly for a six-year term after parliament passes a resolution.

The next step is for parliament to pass Conflict of Interest legislation and establish a Conflict of Interest Code for Members of National Assembly. The mandate of the Ethics Commissioner would be to help appointed and elected officials avert and avoid conflicts between their public duties and private interests.

Moreover, the ethics commissioner will be responsible for administering the Conflict of Interest law and Conflict of Interest Code for parliamentarians. The Conflict of Interest law would be a statutory regime to govern ethical conduct of public office holders, both during and after employment.  Compliance with the law would be a condition of a person’s appointment or employment as a public office holder.

The law would include a definition of what constitutes a conflict of interest, provides for the imposition of administrative monetary penalties for failure by reporting public office holders to meet certain deadlines and gives the Ethics Commissioner the power to self-initiate investigations.

Conflict of Interest Code for Members of National Assembly would include rules on avoiding conflict of interest, practices for the confidential disclosure of private interests to the Commissioner, procedures for making summary information public, an advisory role for the Commissioner and a process for conducting inquiries into alleged contraventions of the rules by Members.

There will require the establishment of a standing committee of the National Assembly on Conflict of Interest and Ethics to review and report on all matters relating to the code. The Ethics Commissioner can occasionally meet with the committee to discuss matters related to the administration of the code.

The government is the foremost guardian of morality and ethical values in the society.  It is the role of the government to ensure that moral and ethical standards are maintained in the society to guarantee order and justice.

Democracy cannot flourish if we do not have some ethical standard of behaviour and practices that all elected representatives and public officials abide by.  The time has come for all levels of parliaments in Pakistan to take ethical issues seriously.