Pakistan’s inability to recognize the sanctity of contracts has led Pakistanis to bear the burden of having to pay for the follies of their leaders. The government of Pakistan is paying US $ 28.7m from the national treasury to a US-based asset recovery firm Broadsheet LLC because Pakistan reneged on a contractual agreement.
As a Dawn editorial notes, this is “a familiar story of official incompetence, poor judgement, irresponsible handling and shoddy legal defence leading to a steep cost being paid by the country.” If this were simply “a one-off issue” then one could dismiss it, but this is instead a trend. “There is a long list of cases where Pakistan has lost in international courts and is either appealing the judgements or negotiating with the aggrieved party on the amount to be repaid.”
Prime Minister Imran Khan had promised to fix the broken system but looks like once again, “No one will be held accountable for the steep cost that Pakistan has been compelled to pay for official incompetence.”
