PM Imran Khan awarded appreciation certificates to the best performing federal ministries

The top 10 ministries recognised for their performance at a ceremony held in Islamabad were as follows :

• Ministry of Communications (Murad Saeed)
• Ministry of Planning, Development and Special Initiatives (Asad Umar)
• Poverty Alleviation and Social Safety Division (Dr Sania Nishtar)
• Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training (Shafqat Mahmood)
• Ministry of Human Rights headed (Dr Shireen Mazari)
• Ministry of Industries and Production headed (Khusro Bakhtiar)
• National Security Division headed (Dr Moeed Yusuf)
• Ministry of Commerce (Abdul Razak Dawood)
• Ministry of Interior (Sheikh Rashid Ahmed)
• Ministry of National Food Security and Research (Syed Fakhar Imam)

Addressing the function, the prime minister singled out Saeed for praise as his ministry came out on top despite his young age.

The premier hailed the initiative as a “great opportunity” since every ministry would get to know how much the others worked. “Our ministries will get incentives to work hard, the more we publicise this,” he added.

The prime minister said that when “marks” — referring to a story from his own days as a student — would be publicised and there would be a corresponding system of rewards and penalties, it would bring an improvement in the governance system’s performance.

He said that no system without rewards and penalties could be successful, giving the example of performance gaps in private and public hospitals.

“When I came, I had very revolutionary ideas to bring sudden changes but I realised our system doesn’t have the capability to absorb sudden shocks incentivising will we bring positive changes in our bureaucracy and ministries.”

Giving his recommendations, the premier said the criteria should be further refined and increased weight should be given to how can a ministry improve its performance to benefit national interest and to bringing “out-of-box solutions” to common problems.

The premier said the appraisal would be a quarterly affair, bonuses would be given on its basis, also adding that in future the top 10 ministries should not be announced beforehand so as to ensure the attendance of all federal ministers.

The Prime Minister’s Office said the rewards were being distributed in accordance with “The Performance Agreement” signed with the federal ministries in which targets were set for them.

It said the agreement would help to improve performance, meet targets, address public issues, formulate effective policy and compile the data needed for good governance.

The PMO added that the main purpose behind the agreement was to evaluate the performance of ministries, enforce a system of rewards and penalties for government officials and improve service delivery.