A mobile app launched by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government to allow the public to voice their grievances over creaking infrastructure has been inundated with responses.
Addressing a press conference in Islamabad on Thursday, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Media Iftikhar Durrani said more than a hundred thousand complaints had been made through the official app, which was launched only a month ago.
The application, known as the Pakistan Citizens’ Portal (PCP), was intended to offer swift resolution for basic civic problems being faced by the people.
But the government has been overwhelmed with responses, particularly about problems in public services like energy, health and education, Durrani said.
He said around 84,000 complaints were yet to be addressed, while around 16,000 had been resolved. Around 4,000 more complaints were received from Pakistanis living abroad, while 96 per cent of those who downloaded the app were men.
Prime Minister Imran Khan had launched the complaint portal on October 28 at a ceremony in the Prime Minister’s Office, saying it was an unprecedented complaint receiving system which none of his predecessors had.
The PCP has been established by the Prime Minister’s Performance Delivery Unit, which is run by those who had established a similar system in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
The system has been connected to government offices in the federal capital and provinces through the internet to receive people’s complaints and transmit them to the officials concerned.
The portal is available to citizens in the form of a cell phone app, but they can also approach the government via telephone, email or written letters. Every complaint has to be addressed within two weeks.
“Good governance will push all departments and the system will keep me informed about the performance of various departments. If they collude (with each other), I will get feedback. The citizens will hold the government accountable, and such feedback has never been given to any prime minister in Pakistan before,” Khan had said at the launch.
Published in Daily Times, November 23rd 2018.
