Tajikistan lacks a transparent personnel policy for the appointment of civil servants, according to Marat Mamadshoev, editor-in-chief of IWPR Tajikistan. In his opinion, it is particularly important to develop clear and verifiable criteria for assessing the performance of civil servants.
Tajikistan, like other neighbors in the region, is a country with a high level of active state intervention in all aspects of public and private life.
State-owned enterprises still dominate industry, and the economy as a whole is dominated by state-owned companies, which have huge preferences over private business. The authorities often use command-and-control methods that have survived since the Soviet era and interfere even in the family and personal affairs of citizens and, under the pretext of fighting poverty, fine violators of this legislation.
The tax burden on business is very high. At the same time, for unknown reasons, a number of state-owned enterprises systematically fail to pay taxes. At the same time, officials are once again voicing initiatives to write off tax debts of state-owned enterprises, which were formed due to incompetent management.
The government has written off tax debts before, and thus emergency measures are becoming the norm.
The author has previously expressed the opinion that Tajikistan needs to privatize state-owned enterprises as soon as possible and time only confirms the correctness of these conclusions.
Based on the size of the government sector, the efficiency of public administration and the quality of the bureaucratic apparatus in Tajikistan is particularly important.
How are personnel selected?
Almost all personnel appointments of the past few years in Tajikistan raise many questions. For example, the mysterious resignation of all heads of security agencies in Khatlon Oblast, which took place in mid-January.
As the presidential press service reported at the time, “the heads of the above-mentioned regional, zonal bodies, several cities and districts of Khatlon Oblast allowed irresponsibility in the performance of their official duties”.
However, to this day there are no concrete explanations as to what the irresponsibility of these leaders manifested itself and how all of them were simultaneously involved in this process of “irresponsibility”.
The composition of the current government was largely formed in 2020, although several leaders have been in office for more than 10 years.
Personnel changes in Tajikistan’s government over the past three years are relatively rare. But when they do occur, they almost always leave questions.
In particular, it is unclear why Tajikistan’s Minister of Labor, Migration and Employment, Shirin Amonzoda, resigned in January 2023. According to the influential Tajik publication Asia-Plus, Shirin Amonzoda was one of the most open for dialog with the public and the press. A statement from the presidential press service merely said that Amonzoda was dismissed “in connection with a transfer to another job”.
We can also recall another recent appointment of the rector of the Tajik National University, Kobiljon Khushvakhtzod, as president of the National Academy of Sciences of Tajikistan. Earlier, the Dissernet community discovered borrowings in Khushvakhtzod’s (then surnamed Barfiev) PhD thesis.
It is unclear why Khushvakhtzoda was appointed to such a position, which requires an impeccable scientific reputation.
Meanwhile, the concept of the state personnel policy of the Republic of Tatarstan, adopted in 2008, mentions “democratism and transparency” among the main principles of the document.
Concept of State Personnel Policy in Tajikistan
The principle of democracy and transparency. The main purpose of this principle is full and constant compliance of the employee’s activity in the interests of the state, society and citizens of the republic. This principle provides for democratic and transparent implementation of measures, change of personnel, selection and competition in staff placement, as well as equal rights and opportunities of citizens in choosing a profession and sphere of activity.
The latest appointments suggest that officials whose main virtue is loyalty are more likely to hold their posts. There are virtually no media personalities among the incumbent ministers. In the past few years, not a single Tajik minister has been interviewed by independent Tajik publications. Quarterly conferences have long ago become a formality.
For example, the public was not given clear information about the reason for the mass blackout of almost the entire country on March 1, about which officials were specifically responsible for the situation and what sanctions were applied to them.
It should be noted that the state agency Khovar, whose heads are civil servants rather than journalists, ignored this emergency situation and did not give a single news item about it, which also speaks about the quality of work of Tajik officialdom.
We can agree that no society is immune to emergencies. Although, on the eve of the blackout there were no force majeure events and therefore the reasons for the emergency situation on March 1 are not clear at all.
It is especially important that the necessary administrative conclusions are drawn from such situations so that such events do not happen again. So far there is no reason to say that such work will be done.
Sorbon Kholmukhammadzoda, Deputy Minister of Energy and Water Resources of Tajikistan, resigned on March 4. The decree states that Kholmukhammadzoda was dismissed from his position “due to transfer to another job”. However, it is unclear whether there is a connection between this resignation and recent events. Especially since Sorbon Kholmukhammadzoda was appointed Deputy Minister of Energy and Water Resources only a year and a half ago and is hardly a key official in this matter.
Assessment of international organizations
In the World Bank (WB) ranking of government efficiency Tajikistan has been consistently at the bottom of the table for the last 20+ years. The situation is approximately the same in neighboring countries, except for Kazakhstan, where the efficiency of the state apparatus is much higher.
The WB rating considers a number of components, including the quality of the bureaucracy, the state of road infrastructure, and the level of education. The lower the indicator, the less effective the government is.
There are a lot of indicators on which the WB rating is compiled and each of them deserves a separate study. But we can agree that the efficiency of the governments of the region is low, which is largely due to the weakness of the bureaucratic apparatus.
There are objective indicators that speak about the low efficiency of the state apparatus.
For example, the same growth of tax arrears, which has been steadily occurring in recent years. Or the fact that tens of thousands of entrepreneurs closed their businesses last year. The foreign trade deficit, which in 2023 amounted to 2.5 times has become a chronic disease of Tajikistan’s economy. While half of the exports are precious metals and the other half aluminum and dried fruits.
There are many problems in the economy and for years they have not been solved.
Among the few positive changes we can say about the growth in the use of Internet technologies in some government agencies, in particular, in the tax service and this process greatly facilitates the work of entrepreneurs.
Lack of performance criteria
It is equally important to define performance criteria for the state apparatus, as these indicators are now completely unclear. These criteria should be clear and verified.
We see that internal Tajik statistics are very often questionable. For example, data on the relatively high growth rates of the Tajik economy seem implausible, although this can be partly explained by the effect of a low base.
While there is an evidence of consistently high labor migration to Russia, the data on the dynamics of unemployment in Tajikistan are frankly implausible.
It seems that Tajik officials are required to work on the picture, not on the result.
Meanwhile, it is possible to find clear and verifiable indicators for almost all spheres of activity of the state apparatus. They also include a variety of international ratings, which provide an opportunity to understand more or less accurately the main development trends.
A comprehensive reform of personnel policy is needed
Some media often criticize the personnel policy pursued by the RT authorities. The criticism states that nepotism or nepotism, compatriotism and personal loyalty are the main criteria in the selection of personnel. It can be added that at present Tajik civil servants are loyal not to the state as a system of institutions, but to specific leaders. Often, a new appointee gets rid of previous personnel and replaces them with his own. Therefore, the personal well-being of the leader becomes the main indicator of performance.
It should be noted that even at the highest level, the authorities themselves recognize the existence of corruption and abuse, which hinders development and becomes one of the reasons for labor migration.
We are not going to talk about the material security of civil servants’ work. But it is certain that personnel reform should be accompanied by an increase in the salaries of officials according to the principle that they should be sufficient for a decent life, but not enough to make savings. There is a global practice, which cautiously says that raising the salaries of officials can lead to a reduction in corruption. And of course, only the worthy should be paid decently.
The next point is the need to reduce the state apparatus with its obviously bloated staff. We see that there has been a 30% reduction in the staff of the traffic police and it has not affected the situation on the roads. On the other hand, we see that without public control the staff of officials will only increase. Intensification of the use of high technologies will make it possible to reduce the staff of the state apparatus.
The following shortcomings of the Tajik civil service can be summarized briefly.
There is no clear personnel policy, it is not known what criteria are used to select candidates for public positions and whether there is a competitive selection process;
In fact, there is no system for training new personnel and there is no personnel reserve;
There is no delegation of authority, no practice of collegial decision-making. Most decisions are made by a narrow circle and communicated to subordinates. Initiative is at least not encouraged, and often punished. Another negative result of such a policy is that local self-government does not develop;
There is no institution of reputation, officials do not feel personal responsibility. Cases when officials resign for failures are extremely rare;
There is no constant media support of their work. It is very important that the public understands what is happening in the corridors of power and what is (not) being done there.