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| Kathmandu, Tuesday March 11, 2003 Falgun 27, 2059. |
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A mockery !
The anti-graft mobile teams set up by the Lokendra Bahadur Chand government on a top
priority
basis has caused more controversy than yielding any result. These teams were assigned to
make the government administration disciplined, responsive and time-bound while
implementing
policies, and were given six months’ tenure for the job. Although the team leader of
the Bagmati
and Narayani zones has claimed more than fifty percent success in the first three months
since
the existence of the mobile teams, the claim is yet to be scrutinised. In fact, its birth
and moves
are mired in controversy. Major political parties have called it
‘unconstitutional’ on the ground that
the teams were formed by the government that they have not yet recognised. But even those
who
do not quite agree with the stand the political parties have taken find the teams’
activities
high-handed, brazen and extra-constitutional. The government employees’ association
has
already made their stance public.
Government officials are usually herded to the places outside their offices, and given
long lectures
and instructions about what to wear and what time to come to the office. In fact, these
are
routines that should be overseen by the Department or the ministry concerned through
permanent
machinery. A temporary team with no administrative experience or expertise can hardly
inject the
element of efficiency, responsiveness or zeal for reforms into the administration which
requires
regular training, incentives, proper service facilities and transparent service and
posting policy.
There is already the constitutional body-the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of
Authority
(CIAA) — to deal with issues that the mobile teams, knowingly or unknowingly, are
dealing with.
Even CIAA is now receiving a flak from different quarters after its apparent vindictive
attitude
towards individuals, and failure to establish the alleged crime in the court of law in
most of the
cases it has handled. Yet, CIAA can be reformed and made accountable once parliament is
elected. But that is not the case with the mobile teams.
Do the words and instructions of the mobile teams carry the weight of the law? Are the
teams or
their members accountable to constitution, parliament or executive? The state seems to
have
adopted a generous gesture in providing the teams with perks and privileges besides
unrestricted
access to the government files. In some areas like Nuwakot, the mobile teams even used a
hospital-owned vehicle to carry on the inspection of government offices. The conduct of
the mobile
teams was not only arbitrary, but also inhumane. In fact, the formation of the mobile
teams is not
an innovation, but a repetition of the practices of the partyless Panchayat regime. The
concept of
having such teams itself has now become irrelevant. Bestowing legitimacy upon such brazen
exercises will only be a mockery of the constitutional system. |
