Balochistan is a unique province of Pakistan. Despite being the largest in terms of physical size accounting for almost half of the country’s territory, it is the smallest province by population, comprising just 5 per cent of the total population.
The region is also the most underdeveloped area of Pakistan, and is troubled by insurgency and conflict from groups that question the legitimacy of the federal government. This context, therefore, is a particularly challenging setting for Rafiullah Kakar (MPP 2013) to apply the lessons he learned on the Blavatnik School of Government’s Master of Public Policy.
Originally from a remote village in the province, Rafiullah arrived in Oxford with great passion for public service. The first person to go to college in his family, he had chosen the MPP to build his existing skills and to learn from other countries’ experiences in experimenting with public policy in order to think about how this might be applied to Pakistan. Following his year on the MPP as a Rhodes Scholar, he stayed at the University for another year to study for an MSc in Global Governance and Diplomacy at the Oxford Department of International Development.
After his two years in Oxford, Rafiullah spent two years working as a Research Officer at the Commonwealth Secretariat in London. During this role, he was lead researcher for the production of the first Youth Development Index (YDI) – a youth-centric version of the United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) Human Development Index (HDI) – and was involved in subsequent capacity building for Commonwealth states across Sub-Saharan Africa and the Pacific region.
Upon returning to Pakistan in 2017, Rafiullah undertook several consultancies with the World Bank and UNDP before getting stuck into policymaking and implementation at senior level in the federal and provincial governments. Tasked with developing Pakistan’s second national security policy, Rafiullah’s MPP skills were put to the test. With multiple stakeholders involved – from the police and military to bureaucrats and the leading political party – negotiation, communication and political savvy were essential for drafting a policy that satisfied all concerned. The resulting policy was approved at the highest level by the cabinet of the government of Pakistan, and shifted the security focus from previous hard measures including the use of force to softer measures focusing on reducing income and regional inequalities and curtailing the sources of extremist narratives.
Following his success in policymaking at the federal government level, Rafiullah decided to return to his home province of Balochistan. There, he heads up a policy delivery unit of around 12 staff members. The unit is responsible for providing strategic policy advice and technical assistance in areas the government of Balochistan identifies as priorities, as well as identifying potential projects and making proposals to the government.
So far, Rafiullah’s team have completed three key projects for the province. First, under his leadership, the unit conducted a thorough review and portfolio analysis of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project for the government of Balochistan and came up with a comprehensive strategy for maximising benefits from CPEC.
Second, Rafiullah was part of the team that conducted a thorough analysis of the state of education in the province, using both quantitative and qualitative data from the past ten years to inform their conclusions.
“My studies at the Blavatnik School of Government gave me a solid theoretical idea of policy concepts and challenges, and I learned so much on this education project in particular putting these theories into practice.”
This thorough analysis and evaluation allowed them to create an education sector plan for the province complete with an action plan, and a monitoring and evaluation plan. The plan serves as the guiding education policy document for the next five years.
Finally, to address the infrastructure gaps in Balochistan, Rafiullah led on the development of a complete public-private partnership framework in the province. This not only involved drafting policy and legislation to establish the legal boundaries of the partnership, but also building an entire new institutional setup to implement and administer the partnership and creating new entities for the regulation of the partnership. Additionally, Rafiullah and his team have provided technical assistance to the Government of Balochistan on a number of other policy issues including development of data-based tools to inform development planning, e-governance initiatives, social protection strategy, and governance and institutional reforms.
In spite of the challenges this role presents to him, Rafiullah unquestionably appreciates the opportunities it also offers. Being able to work in the public sector, but in a slightly external unit that is not limited by traditional public sector constraints. He also signals that he derives great satisfaction from the challenge of taking what he learnt during the MPP to a very unique concept.
“When you have read all these theoretical concepts and when you try to apply them in a conflict zone like Balochistan then you have to do a lot of self-evaluation and analysis and review and then you have to work hard to realise which parts of these theoretical concepts probably do not apply.”
In addition to his busy schedule at the highest levels of provincial government, Rafiullah has also spent the past two years teaching at the National School of Public Policy in Pakistan. His students are mid-career and senior government professionals who have an average of 10 - 20 years’ experience in policymaking and who Rafiullah credits with teaching him as much as he teaches them.
“They have been doing similar work for 10 to 20 years, so they share actual lessons, stories and experiments that they've learned from their work so that helps me we find and rethink my own understanding and improve my own knowledge of that particular topic, so it's been a very rewarding experience.”
Rafiullah’s dedication to serving his home province, both through evidence-based policymaking and sharing lessons and ideas through his teaching, is obvious. Would he ever be persuaded by a job opportunity elsewhere? Save for perhaps a stint at the World Bank in Washington, DC or returning to the School to complete a DPhil, Rafiullah envisions his future in Pakistan. He believes that the devolution of social sectors to provinces has created many opportunities for policy practitioners and specialists as provincial governments are facing capacity constraints. Rafiullah’s commitment to improving governance and putting public institutions at the service of their people will remain a long-term characteristic of his career.
Rafiullah was a Rhodes Scholar.
November 2021.