Yeah, as I said earlier, is that why Dar was nominated the "
Ishaq Dar wins ‘Finance Minister of the Year for South Asia’ Award"?
You probably need proper education on historical import/export ratio and when and how things started to change:
View attachment 721980
You may also wish to read the entire comparison
here.
As for DAR's performance, well who better than the ex-Minister himself to assess the current performance:
The government has released a paper containing its two-year
economic performance which merits a realistic fact-based comparative analysis in order to see the true picture. The practical way to do so is to examine the key
economic indicators which
PTI government inherited from PMLN in 2018 and study where these stand at the close of two years ending FY20.
GDP: The GDP growth is a key indicator as it reflects the overall
economic activity of a country which provides jobs opportunities, reduces poverty, increases per capita income. It declined from 5.8% to 1.9% in the first year and further slumped to negative-0.4% (after 68 years) at the end of the second year. Global financial institutions have stated that the negative growth of 0.4% for FY20 has been understated by the government and it would finally end up around negative-2% when the revised figures will be released in due course as the incumbent government had revised last year its official GDP growth figure of 3.3% for first year to 1.9%. The size of GDP has shrunk from $315 billion to $264 billion in two years, resulting in a national income loss of $51 billion. Consequently, per capita income which had increased by 24% during FYrs14-18 to $1,652 has unfortunately reduced by 16% to $1,388 in two years to FY20.
Inflation: The most relevant
economic indicators from common man’s viewpoint are commodities’ prices related as these indicate the inflation
(mehngaee) on ground; in two years to FY20, consumer price index (CPI) has risen from 4% to 10.5%, wholesale price index (WPI) from 4.7% to 11% and sensitive price index (SPI) from 2.4 to 14% which are reflected in almost doubling of the prices of sugar, wheat flour, vegetables, pulses, medicines, natural gas and electricity. Food inflation which was less than 2% two years ago has risen to 15% which has caused massive unrest of masses as multi millions are now unable to even afford two square meals a day.
Unemployment: The number of jobless people has increased in the last two years by at least over 50% and the unemployment rate has risen to over 10% by FY20. Contrary to PTI’s promise, the government has recently terminated jobs of nearly 10,000 employees of Pakistan Steel Mills(PSM).
PTI has forgotten that PMLN tried to reform and restructure PSM and PIA in 2016 without any plan to lay-off even a single employee of both organisations but
PTI played negative politics by staging rallies in Karachi against such plan and sponsored strikes in Karachi which ended up with few deaths of innocent people. This high unemployment rate coupled with unaffordable prices of daily use commodities has caused lot of frustration in the suffering families.
Poverty: PMLN managed in its 2013-18 tenure to reduce the number of people living below the poverty line by 6% but this national achievement has eroded in last two years and the poverty number has already gone back to square one. Sadly, over 10 million families have been pushed into abject poverty with an even larger number who are facing food insecurity.
Social Safety Net Program: In an Islamic Republic it is the duty of the State to look after its people who are most vulnerable and deserve financial assistance. It is with this background that the scribe proposed in May 2008 to the PPP-PMLN coalition cabinet for launch in the forthcoming budget of an income support program (later named BISP) with Rs 34 billion which was duly announced in the federal budget for FY09. BISP allocations got increased to Rs 40 billion during PPP five years tenure to FY13. PMLN made a quantum jump of 270% in this noble-support expenditure to Rs 148 billion (BISP 124/ youth 20/ Baitulmal 4) during its tenure to FY18. Further increase in the last two years by
PTI government in social safety net support program, regardless of the rebranded name of ‘Ehsas’, is in a positive direction.
Petroleum Products Prices: PTI leaders used to make a big hue and cry with naming ‘petroleum levy’ as an oppressive tax on petroleum products. Taking a U-turn, it seems that the PTI’s one of main items to mobilise revenue is through this levy which increased from Rs 179 billion to Rs 260 billion in two years which has now been budgeted to yield an unprecedented amount of Rs 450 billion in FY21, that is 251 percent higher than PMLN’s FY18. This hike in levy has resulted in a huge increase in prices of petroleum products which has added to misery of people who can’t afford even the increase in prices of essential commodities and medicines.
FBR Taxes Revenue: PM Imran Niazi made a public pledge to increase FBR Tax Revenue to Rs 8,000 billion within one year. Against PMLN’s revenue collection increase by 97% to Rs 3,842 billion in FY18, PTI’s collection for FY19 was Rs 3,829 billion which showed negative growth after 23 years and for FY20 the official taxes collection number of Rs 3,998 billion has been announced but if one takes into account the refunds of Rs 101 billion made through supplementary grant coupled with outstanding SRO1125 refunds of Rs 71 billion, the true taxes revenue for FY20 is Rs 3,827 billion, again a negative taxes collection figure. This is the very pathetic
performance when viewed with huge new taxation of around Rs 900 billion by
PTI in the last two years.
Public Debt: PTI pledged to the nation to reduce the public debt by Rs.10 trillion, which stood at Rs.24.2 trillion at the close of FY18. In reality, the debt in the two years of
PTI government has increased by 41% to Rs.34.5 trillion, an alarming rate of increase that is far speedier than PMLN without investing in any mega visible project like that of PMLN’s power generation, motorways & highways, communication infrastructure ones. Public debt projections shared confidentially with IFIs by the government indicate that the public debt figure would increase to Rs 47 trillion by FY23. Public debt and liabilities figure also reveal an increase of 43% from Rs. 30 trillion to Rs. 43 trillion in the last two years.
Fiscal Deficit: In its first two fiscal years,
PTI govt has increased budget deficit from Rs 2,260 billion to Rs 3,376 billion or from 6.6% to 8.1% of GDP, main reasons for such escalation are its failure to enhance taxes revenue collection and its inability to control the current account expenditure which rose by 35% from Rs 4,704 billion (FY18) to Rs 6,372 billion (FY20). If the un-spent federal PSDP of Rs 234 billion and un-utilised COVID-19 allocation of Rs 540 billion during FY20 are taken into account, then the real fiscal deficit is Rs 4,150 billion or 9.95% as against the reported number of Rs 3,376 billion or 8.1% of GDP.
Foreign Remittances: FR had increased by 43% to $ 19.9 billion in five years to FY18. These have further gone up by 16% to $ 23.1 billion in the last two years. One hopes that this upward trend continues as FR are a great contributor towards the external balance of payments. COVID-19-pushed
economic difficulties in most of the countries are resulting in jobs termination of our workforce abroad.
Current Account Deficit: CAD was in the range of $4B billion plus annually in the FYrs14-16 and shot up to $12 billion in FY17 and $19 billion in FY18. Later two years were extraordinary as forex payments were to be made for energy projects to end 18 hours a day load shedding, CPEC and other infrastructure development related investments in addition to security-related urgent payments. CAD was to come down substantially in FY19 and onwards as major one-off payments had been completed by FY18. But the way imports have been curtailed mercilessly in the last two years by imposing sky-high customs duty to improve the CAD isn’t very prudent as the industrial activity has halted completely, resulting in negative-10% growth in large scale manufacturing (LSM) with millions of jobs redundancies and severe negative impact on the overall economy.
Pak Rupee Devaluation: PTI government chose to follow pseudo-intellectuals’ bookish theory, who were propagating slide of rupee to $/Rs 127 to boost exports, and allowed self-slide devaluation but could not manage to handle it later. Despite that rupee-dollar parity has fallen to 168 in two years, the exports for both FY19 and FY20 have shown a decline. While PMLN had insulated 92 percent of the economy (exports being 8 percent) from the damage of devaluation during its tenure and got the growth of 12.7% in exports for FY18 with targeted support,
PTI has ruined the entire economy by blindly sliding the rupee which resulted in massive inflation, closure of businesses, industrial stagnation, negative GDP growth with increased poverty and unemployment. The devaluation alone has caused national loss of Rs 4,840 billion (equal to $ 29 billion) through an increase in public debt in the last two years.
Policy (Interest) Rate: With the improvement in macroeconomic indicators, better sovereign ratings and built up of forex reserves with the stable rupee, PMLN managed to bring down in its tenure SBP policy rate to 6.25%, export refinance (ERF) and long term finance facility (LTFF) to 3% which were lowest in decades; with core inflation, at 4% the real interest rate was positive at 2.25%. In contrast to PMLN’s
performance,
PTI raised the interest rate to 13.25% due to decades high inflation triggered by massive rupee devaluation and poor
economic performance. The government had been raising dollars deposits in the last two years by issuing short term sovereign paper with 13.25% interest rate known as ‘Hot Money.’ This failed aspect of monetary policy alone doubled the national annual debt servicing cost from Rs 1,500 billion to Rs 3,000 billion and impaired the industrial activity in the country with a negative 7% LSM growth. Following Covid-19 pandemic, the unbearable policy rate was reluctantly brought down to 7% in phases on this account and has naturally led to a massive withdrawal of hot-money dollars deposits.
Power Circular Debt: PTI always criticised the accumulation of power circular debt. It was Rs 503 billion at the close of FY13 which increased to Rs 1100 billion by FY18.
PTI Energy Minister announced its reduction to Rs 100 billion by FY20 but in reality the same has jacked up with great speed to Rs 2,200 billion. Energy bills collection which increased from 84% to 93% by FY18 has deteriorated to 81% in the last two years. Likewise, transmission and distribution losses, which had improved from 22% to 18% by FY18, have increased to 19% by FY20.
Covid-19 Pandemic: PTI government’s intervention to reduce severe adverse effects of Covid-19 pandemic on people and economy has been ineffective. An inadequate package of Rs 1240 billion was announced for this purpose which also included regular allocations of Rs 570 billion (Rs 280 billion wheat procurement, Rs 100 billion exporters’ overdue refunds and Rs 190 billion Ehsas program) to inflate the true support amount; of the remaining balance of Rs 670 billion, there was still an un-utilised amount of Rs 540 billion at the close of FY20 which appears to have been done on purpose to reduce fiscal deficit of the said fiscal year. Regrettably, there is obvious mishandling of the pandemic as it began and surged in Pakistan with the immature and unwise permission by the government which allowed entry of likely pandemic-carriers without required medical handling at the borders.
Globally recognised
economic performance of Pakistan by FY17 was unfortunately hindered by sponsored political instability in the country in order to launch
PTI government which has proved in the last two years to be one of the most incompetent, visionless, incompetent and driven by sugar-wheat-medicines etc mafias who collectively are responsible for the mismanagement of the economy. With negative GDP growth, stagnant taxes collection, rising public debt, high fiscal deficit, double digits inflation and peaking jobless-cum-poverty numbers, the government has turned out to be a nightmare for the overwhelming majority population who cannot afford anymore essential commodities of daily use and two square meals a day.
But, you post the exact same post repeatedly and all over the forum without going into details why the imports increased so much, here's your chance to understand why imports increased, specifically targeting CPEC Project, which will ultimately bear fruit for the country forever, Inshallah:
All efforts of the incumbent Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) government to control the yawning trade deficit have failed to deliver. The PML-N regime tried to slap tariff and non-tariff barriers to achieve the desired results, however the method failed due to some apparent factors.
The first and foremost factor was finalisation of China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) as it was done in haste and without proper homework.
There is need to do some soul searching at this stage when the pace of CPEC is expected to slowdown in the wake of the ongoing political transitions happening in both Pakistan and China.
The change of government will happen in China, although, the ruling Communist Party will continue to rule over the country. In Pakistan, there will be three governments assuming rein of powers including the existing PML-N, the upcoming caretaker setup, and finally the government coming into power after winning the next general elections.
It is the wish of the PML-N led regime to inaugurate ML-1 (Mainline one) from Peshawar to Karachi as expressed by Minister for Interior Ahsan Iqbal, but so far Chinese are non-committal in finalising this deal up to May 2018.
Although, there is no iota of doubt that CPEC can be termed a fate changer for Pakistan, its sequencing was done in the wrong manner. The policy makers miserably remained unable to visualise the challenges arising out in the shape of trade and current account deficits at least for the short and medium-term periods. Secondly, they failed to come up with solutions to cope with these challenges.
The result of these failures is visible for all and sundry now, as the trade deficit has widened to $21.546 billion just in the first seven months (July-January) period of the current fiscal year against $17.351 billion in the same period of the last fiscal year 2016-17. The surge is a whopping 24.18 percent in the trade deficit.
In January 2018 alone, the trade deficit touched its peak and climbed to $3.636 billion, the highest registered in a month in Pakistan’s history. The trade deficit was projected to go close to $40 billion for the current fiscal year when compared against $32.4 billion in the last financial year.
What went wrong in sequencing the economic corridor?
When the PML-N finalised the CPEC with its Chinese counterparts after coming to power in 2013, following the general elections, Pakistan’s growth was at its lowest ebb. It was hovering in the range of 2.5 percent to three percent on average annually. However, with the help of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) programme, the government restored macroeconomic stability. Using the IMF programme, it was able to attain certain stability and set the direction for achieving higher growth trajectory, in the range of five to six percent.
Under the CPEC, Pakistan requested China to help overcome the energy shortages by investing in installation of power plants and removing infrastructure bottlenecks through early harvest programme.
This request had some repercussions, which the policy makers should have known beforehand. Investment in these two sectors – power and infrastructure – was bound to cause surge in imports, especially in shape of machinery and raw materials. It was a blunder on part of the Pakistani negotiators who made no efforts to convince the Chinese to relocate their industries in the existing economic zones. They should have urged the Chinese side to simultaneously shift some of the industries to the existing zones in Hattar and Karachi, as well as some parts of Punjab. This could have helped boost exports without wasting too much time.
Moreover, the government should have taken the declining exports as a red flag and should have declared an emergency to achieve a major jump in exports. It is an unforgivable blunder on part of the PML-N government that exports, instead of increasing in the last four years have declined.
Another mistake made by the Pakistani policy makers was not convincing the Chinese to revise investment arrangements, whereby relocating their industries required for manufacturing power plants or at least solar plants to these economic zones at the first stage.
Keeping the exchange rate unchanged also was an issue. Who was responsible for doing that? Why was the government unable to resolve the refunds issue of exporters, which caused the liquidity crunch? And now, who is responsible for not sequencing the CPEC correctly?
All responsible must be held accountable by the government, because it was not the job of China to visualise the structural weaknesses of Pakistan’s economy.
The fallout of wrong policies would certainly impact the CPEC too however, and as a result the overall relations of both the countries too.
To avert the looming and clear cut crisis on the economic front, Pakistan’s top political and military leadership would have to jointly request China for providing balance of payment support to bridge the yawning trade and current account deficits. Or else, Islamabad would be left with no other option but to knock the door of the IMF again. It would be the last resort to avert the crisis.
The political and military leadership have to keep in mind that it was none other than China that advised Islamabad to go back to the IMF in 2013, when the country had plunged into macroeconomic crisis. Therefore, chances of a different outcome this time around may be expecting too much from China.
There is no harm in exploring different options at this stage though. Many independent economists are already expressing their apprehensions that the IMF may take a different view this time around in view of the tweet of US President Donald Trump at the very outset of this calendar year 2018.
Among major other factors, Pakistan’s trade imbalance has further worsened because of rising petroleum and furnace oil prices in the international market, rampant surge in imports of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and continuous hike in imports of machinery and raw material to fuel the growth trajectory of Pakistan.
Pakistan’s Federal Secretary for Commerce Younas Dagha, who recently led the country’s delegation for holding the 9th round of talks with China for revising the free trade agreement (FTA), said the trade deficit had risen because of surge in fuel imports and some other factors. He reminded that the exports also jumped up by achieving 11 percent growth compared to the last year.
Dagha said Pakistan and China were able to evolve consensus for revising the whole of FTA which was expected to be signed next month after getting the approval of the federal cabinet.
Time has come to send an SOS to China for helping Islamabad overcome the lingering crisis, forging consensus among all political parties on the charter of the economy for the next 10 to 15 years. Half-hearted steps would not resolve our problems on permanent basis.
This time window dressing will not solve our problems as we have always done in the past. Consensus on structural reforms is a much needed requirement of this hour to find long-term solutions.
Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi should make efforts and take desired steps to correct the economy immediately, because the downslide is going to accelerate in months and quarters to come.
Keeping the economy on the backburner anymore will further aggravate the pace of the looming crisis and there will be no other loser but Pakistan and its poor people.
Ah yes, the curious....well, not really, case of CAD/CAS; the status for the month of
December is:
In line with market expectation,
Pakistan’s current account balance - the difference between government’s foreign income and expenditure - recorded a deficit of $662 million in December 2020 after remaining in surplus for a record period of five months (July-November) of
current fiscal year 2020-21.
The current account deficit primarily stemmed from a jump in imports to over $5 billion in December 2020 after quite a long hiatus. Growing import payment pressure may turn the rupee weaker against the US dollar and other major currencies like euro and pound sterling.
“Imports of some essential food items as well as growth-enhancing capital goods, oil and industrial raw material rose on the back of domestic economic recovery,” the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) said on its official Twitter handle on Wednesday.
“The return of deficit was in line with market expectation. It, however, came in higher than market’s estimate,” Pak-Kuwait Investment Company Head of Research Samiullah Tariq said while talking to The Express Tribune.
“In December 2020, the current account registered a deficit of $662 million after remaining in surplus for the past five months. Cumulatively, in the first six months of FY21, the current account remains in surplus at $1.1 billion compared to a deficit of over $2 billion during 6MFY20,” the SBP said.
The deficit for December 2020 was up by 131% compared to $287 million in the same month of previous year.
The deficit was higher than market expectation “due to the doubling of primary income deficit (increase in repatriation of profit by foreign firms operating in Pakistan to their headquarters) in December 2020 compared to the previous month of November.”
“Imports were significantly high. They should go down in coming months after fresh supplies of locally produced sugar arrive in the market and fresh production of wheat is available from the end of February or March,” Tariq said.
Besides, a steady growth in export earnings and strong inflows of workers’ remittances from overseas Pakistanis would help restrict the current account deficit to around $200-300 million a month in the second half (January-June) of FY21, he said. A significant growth in IT exports would also play a part in bringing down the current account deficit, he said.
AHL Research said imports rose 27%, or $1.22 billion, to $5.02 billion in December 2020 compared to the same month of previous year. Imports rose to a two-year high after hitting $6.44 billion in July 2018.
However, exports and remittances were also up 8% and 16% year-on-year respectively during December 2020.
“The outlook for the external sector has improved since the previous set of projections published in SBP’s FY20 Annual Report. The current account deficit is now projected to be in the range of 0.5-1.5% of GDP (earlier 1-2% of GDP),” the central bank said in its recent report titled The State of Pakistan’s Economy.
The revision in the deficit is mainly due to an upward adjustment in workers’
remittances, which are now expected to be in the range of $24-25 billion (earlier $22-23 billion), it said.
However, projections for workers’ remittances are subject to risk from the outlook for oil-exporting Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) economies, whose fiscal balances might deteriorate further with the escalation in global Covid-19 infections. This may translate into a sizable reduction in their demand for foreign workers, leading to lower remittance inflows in Pakistan, the SBP said.
The outlook of exports and imports largely remains unchanged from the earlier assessment. The greater quantum of high value-added textiles and food commodities - especially rice - are expected to generate above-target growth in exports. That said, the key downside risk to this outlook stems from the resurgence of
Covid-19 in major export destinations of Pakistan, which has the potential to suppress demand, the report added.
On the upside, the incentives given in the industrial support package since early November 2020 may help textile sector exports perform better.
“Similarly, imports are projected to surpass their annual target. The increase in food imports and domestic economic activity is mainly expected to drive import growth. That said, the increase in global Covid-19 infections and further decline in crude oil prices could lower import payments,” it said.
And coming to another important point, the ever-rising external debt......thanks to the PTI Government, which has taken more debt in 2 years than PML did in entire 5 years and is still blamed for the financial crisis which is actually the fault of PTI; I mean the disaster one has to be to blame the previous Government despite PTI adding an unprecedented % to the debt in just the first 2 years.....This at the time when the previous Government was expanding the economy at 6.8% per annum whereas PTI has been destroying the economy at -0.4% or thereabouts:
View attachment 721981
Yeah, good that you highlighted how much better off we were before the PTI disaster hit us leading us to (The Culprit Marked by Black Outline):
View attachment 721982
In the meantime, recent repeated Sugar and Wheat crises are just the tip of the iceberg, that is PTI, to hit Pakistan:
Source:
Sweet & Sour Governance
SOMETIMES what official reports do not say is more important that what they do say.
The virus-plagued landscape was rocked last week by two FIA-led reports that contained fairly good content and fairly bad grammar. They delved into the murky world of the sugar and wheat sectors. Commissioned by Prime Minister Imran Khan in the wake of shortages and price hikes earlier this year, the reports are littered with data and ‘findings’ that will shock absolutely no one in particular. And yet the magnitude of faux-outrage has registered fairly high on the political Richter scale.
So what gives?
The crux of the yawn-inducing findings: federal government approved the export of sugar, the Punjab government approved a subsidy and sugar mill owners made a killing. We are also told such salacious facts like which sugar baron commands what percentage of the market share. The rest is left to our imagination.
When imagination takes over, nothing else stands a chance. Nothing. So one person’s wild imagination runs on to TV screens and says the prime minister has just won a crusade against the biggest mafia of all; another man’s wilder imagination leaps on to the front pages of newspapers and proclaims with relish that the leader has accomplished what he had set out to do; while yet another unbridled, unharnessed and maniacally uncontrollable imagination sprints to the social media minefield to herald the end of all conflicts of interest in the government. Forever. And Ever.
Right then.
Back in the real world, things are a bit different. Here such weighty reports are expected to be less an indictment of an individual and more that of the system that produces situations that in turn produce such reports. If someone, somewhere did not like Jahangir Tareen because he was making oodles of money while wielding outsized influence over the running of the ruling party and the government this ruling party rules, well then that person is a tad bit late to the game. Tareen did not start making money a few months ago. Tareen also did not start wielding outsized influence on the party and government a few months ago. If he ends up becoming the only casualty of the report, something is clearly amiss.
Actually, it is more than just something. When we zoom out of the individual-specific focus and pan across the wider arc of systemic rot, a more expansive set of variables come into focus.
Act 1, Scene 1: In October 2018, the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) meets to discuss an agenda that includes the question of allowing the export of sugar. The meeting is chaired by the then finance minister, Asad Umar, and in attendance is a galaxy of ministerial grandees like Razzaq Dawood, Khusro Bakhtiyar, Ghulam Sarwar Khan, Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, as well as the governors of the State Bank of Pakistan. This august forum is provided a summary by the food ministry that contains numbers and dates; it says there is excess stock of sugar available with the mills. Some among the ministerial grandees argue that this excess sugar should be allowed for export so that ‘local farmers can benefit’. The finance minister agrees and the approval is granted.
Act 1, Scene 2: In December 2018, the matter of export is brought in front of the Punjab government. The word ‘subsidy’ surreptitiously creeps into the discussion. The finance ministry of Punjab disagrees with the grant of subsidy, and says so in writing. The government of Punjab goes ahead anyway and grants a subsidy of Rs3 billion to the sugar industry for export. Many sugar barons make a killing.
Act 2, Scene 1: In December 2018, the retail price of sugar stands at Rs55.99 per kilo. By February 2020, the sweet stuff is selling at Rs79.86 per kg.
Act 2, Scene 2: Well, here is where this scene is still being scripted. The script may have a predictable ending, but what it should, ideally, weave together is a narrative that goes something like this:
The ECC made a decision that was its to make. Fair enough. But what did it base its decision on? A summary by the food ministry. What was that summary based on? A set of data about existing stocks of sugar. Where did this data come from? A food inspector must have visited all sugar mills and noted down exact figures? How is his information verified? Has the source code for possible systemic manipulations ever been dissected down to the bare minimum in an effort to repair and reform it?
In this particular case, was there in fact the kind of surplus stock that was reported to the ECC? Perhaps there was. But if in case — just in case — there was not, can you imagine the magnitude of the fallout of a decision made in good spirit by the ECC?
Points to ponder.
And points to wonder too. The government of Punjab made a call to grant the subsidy for sugar import. Fair enough. If it was a good decision, should we not know whom to reward? If it was a bad decision, should we not know whom to punish? Perhaps everyone did the right thing by making the right call based on the right information, laced with the right intentions, for all the right reasons.
Perhaps when in doubt, best to turn to Shakespeare:
Act 3, Scene 3 (The play Julius Caesar)
Cinna the Poet: Directly, I am going to Caesar’s funeral.
First Citizen: As a friend or an enemy?
Cinna the Poet: As a friend.
Third Citizen: Your name, sir, truly.
Cinna the Poet: Truly, my name is Cinna.
First Citizen: Tear him to pieces; he’s a conspirator.
Cinna the Poet: I am Cinna the poet, I am Cinna the poet.
Fourth Citizen: Tear him for his bad verses, tear him for his bad verses.
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