Govt determined to keep law and order, control corruption
PM furnishes replies to lawmakers

BY A STAFF REPORTER

Kathmandu, July 5:The House of Representatives today endorsed the budget for the new fiscal year with a majority voice vote.

Speaker Taranath Ranabhat asked the lawmakers to vote on the Appropriations Bill tabled by Finance Minister Mahesh Acharya.

The estimates of revenue and expenditure for 2000/2001 presented by Acharya on May 30 amount to 91 billion, 621 million and 335 thousand rupees.

The main opposition Communist Party Of Nepal (United Marxist-Leninist) along with other opposition parties voted against the Appropriations Bill when it was put up for voting today.

A simple majority of 103 votes is required for the passage of the budget. The ruling Nepali Congress has 113 legislators in the 205 member House of Representatives.

Earlier, the House rejected 41 proposals of the opposition parties seeking reduction of rupees 100 in the budget allocations of different Ministries.

Of the proposals, 13 came from the Main Opposition Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist), 14 from the Rastriya Prajatantra Party, Seven from United People’s Front Nepal, four from Nepal Sadbhavana Party and three from National People’s Front.

Earlier, Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala said the government was determined to bring about changes in the country through an understanding with the opposition.

He was furnishing replies to the lawmakers’ queries on appropriation heads concerning the Secretariat of Council of Ministers, the Prime Minister’s Office, the National Planning Commission, the Ministries of Women, Children and Social Welfare, Labour and Transport Management and General Administration that he is looking after.

The government is committed to eradicating corruption, giving good governance and maintaining law and order situation in the country with the support from the House since it took office, he said.

Prime Minister Koirala said the government was continuously having talks with the opposition parties on major national issues, including corruption, good governance and peace and security situation in the country. "Peace is the foundation for the all round development of the nation. Therefore, the government is thinking over the possibility of a peaceful dialogue with those who have resorted to the path of violence and terrorism."

The first and foremost duty of the government is to maintain law and order in the country, he said adding it is natural that the pace of development has slackened due to diversion of national sources which ought to be used for developmental work towards maintenance of peace and security. "Therefore, everyone concerned should contribute to getting the country rid of the murder and violence."

Since the beginning of the current fiscal year, the government has made efforts to sanction various plans and programmes in a proportionate manner in consistence with the geographical features, demography and the requirements of such district, Koirala said.

RSS adds: The budget for the central region is large due to the concentration of a maximum number of national level projects in this region as well as the focus in the central level budget on education and health, Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala said.

He made it clear that larger appropriations have been made because of a number of developmental projects, which are in operation and the continuity in the assistance from donor agencies for such on-going projects.

He informed the house that the involvement of and effectiveness in the regional planning offices would be increased to follow up and assess projects including those in poverty alleviation from next year and implementation and supervision of this work would be carried out by the national planning commission.

The developmental programmes have been set out keeping in mind poverty alleviation, the main thrust of the 9th plan, he said and made it clear that the government has adopted a policy of playing the role of facilitator in the industry and commerce sectors and a catalytic role in setting up physical and social infrastructure.

He mentioned that the government has endorsed the basis and set out the working procedures for making appointments to government undertakings transparent in order to make the administrative mechanism prompt, competent and economical and make the people feel this change. The process has been initiated for changing the ownership of undertakings, committees, councils, boards or commissions which have no use, are inactive or have no reason to be in existence.

Referring to the policy of the government to confine its role to the formulation of policy matters and let the bodies responsible for mobilisation of employees do the implementing, he said the government is firm in its belief that interference in the staffing on the basis of creed would not lead to desired results.

He said that transfers, promotion and other procedures concerning o employees are being executed as per the existing legal framework.

He said different measures have been taken in order to maintain uniformity and transparency among the different government bodies and other public enterprises and made it clear that the government has raised the pay for government employees to make the entire administrative mechanism performance and result oriented.

Reduction in the number of ministries as well as employees in a proper way are under way as part of its effort to restructure the existing organisational set up of the ministries, he added.

Prime Minister Koirala also assured of bringing in a bill in parliament concerning the commission for investigation of abuse of authority to make it strong and result-oriented and put in place institutional and other procedural arrangements in a bid to curb corruption, revenue leakage and irregularities which are posing a challenge to the country.

He informed that the government has determined a new wage pay rate for labourers on the basis of the recommendations submitted by the minimum wage determination committee in accordance with the labour act, and brought it into effect from the current fiscal year.

He said that an act concerning juvenile courts has been brought out recently and its regulations are being prepared. Once the task is completed, it will be implemented effectively.

A law has also been mulled over for the rights and interests of labourers working in transport sector, he said.

He informed that the government has taken initiative towards setting up and activating diplomatic missions in view of the cheating from time to time by manpower agencies and the troubles borne by the employees since overseas employment is a useful means to an end to the murderous activity.

In reply to a question, the Prime Minister said the government is determined to empower women and a bill concerning women’s rights is under consideration in the house.

He further said that he would furnish details about the achievements of the proposed visit to India after completing it.

He said that the government has accorded special priority to Karnali zone by instituting a poverty alleviation fund.

Responding to another question, he said the government has kept opened the door for dialogue with the Maoists at all times.

MPs Asta Laxmi Shakya, Budhhiman Tamang, Badri Prasad Mandal, Dilliraj Khanal, Hari Acharya, Rajendra Prasad Pandey, Til Kumar Meyongwo, Prakash Jwala, Yadav Bahadur Rayamajhi, Kunta Sharma, Ram Kumar Choudhari, Netra Lal Shrestha, Renu Kumari Yadav, Shankar Nath Sharma, Pradeep Kumar Gyawali, Suresh Kumar Karki, Shushila Nepal, Nara Bahadur Hamal, Chandra Bahadur Shahi, Parashu Ram Meghi Gurung, Urmila Aryal, Pashupati Chaulagain, Phatik Bahadur Thapa, Basanta Kumar Nemwang, Hitkaji Gurung, Prem Bahadur Singh, Gokarna Bista had asked questions to Prime Minister.

Fertiliser shortage in Ramechhap

Ramechhap, July 5 (RSS)Local farmers in Ramechhap district where food scarcity is a common phenomenon are worried about the shortage of fertilisers for the maize crop which is otherwise doing well thanks to the favourable weather.

Since most of the farmers have to queue up at the Agricultural Inputs Corporation depot for fertiliser without any certainty of its being available, they tend to end up buying sub-standard fertiliser from local vendors.

Out of a quota of 200 sacks of urea fertiliser allotted for each VDC in the district, officials of the corporation are selling on the sly to businessmen for a commission, farmer Kumar Ghimire says.

Since the VDC turned a deaf ear to calls made for providing fertiliser to farmers after witnessing a businessman getting hold of a huge quantity of the commodity, I took up the issue with the chief district officer, another farmer, Ratna Bahadur Bhujel, says.

But the CDO sidestepped the issue saying that quotas for such VDCs would be cancelled next year, the farmer said adding that he has bought his fertiliser from the market.

Asked whether the fertiliser being brought in by agents is pure or not, agricultural development officer Tikaram Muli says no inspection has been made in this connection nor any complaint received to date from any quarter.

Tourism to go to the ‘grassroots,’ at last

BY NAVIN SINGH KHADKA

Kathmandu, July 5: A freshly documented policy will be a road map for a foreign-aided rural tourism project to be implemented at different places across the Kingdom within this fiscal year.

Based on the trickle-down theory, the policy – named as Tourism Policy for Rural Poverty Alleviation – targets rural poor population. "The idea is to use tourism to generate employment and to reduce poverty in the rural areas," says Dr. Chandra Prakash Gurung, Resident Representative of World Wide Fund Nepal Office, who was one of the designers of the policy.

Initially, the village tourism modules will be developed at three or four different places, according to Dr. Shankar Sharma, a member of National Planning Commission (NPC). "Though we have had different eco-tourism products like trekking and mountaineering, this idea is going to be different and the necessary infrastructures will also be built in the places where the projects will be run."

Playing the lead role to propel the idea of rural tourism project are two foreign agencies – United Nations Development Program and SNV (Netherlands Development Organisation). Officials with these agencies stress that the policy basically focuses on taking tourism’s benefit to grass-root level.

"For that purpose, the grass root people will be mobilised and we will have modular approach in different sizes," said Tek Gurung of UNDP. "In summary, the project will be pro-poor."

Tourism and development experts have time and again pointed out that travel industry has been benefiting mostly established tour operators in the centre and those from well-off families in the remote areas. Nepal earned a record US $ 152 million as foreign exchange earning in 1998 – a 35 per cent increase in 1997 record.

The major portion of the national tourism comprises of nature based products – whether it is adventure based tourism or simply sight seeing of natural, cultural and social products. Above 30 per cent of inbound tourists are either trekkers or mountaineers. Which means, for these visitors, village tourism will indeed be an attractive product. But that is not all.

Records show above 55 per cent of the visitors arrive here for holiday pleasure. Majority of these tourists, tourism experts say, would like to see the unique Nepalese traditional lifestyle, custom, culture, among others, amidst the varieties of scenic grandeur Nepal has on offer. For this mixture of perfection, rural tourism has been the answer.

But, how will the project reach the poor? Says John Hummel of SNV, "The project will help the local communities by developing different tourism products and services which will be linked up with travel and trekking agencies who will sell them."

The project will have a mechanism of using district-based committees to work as a mediator between the local communities and tour operators. Initially planned for five years, the project sites will first be based in villages of Dolpa, Chitwan Hills, Langtang, Humla, among others.

Its designers say the project is based on the experiences of Annapurna Conservation Area Project (ACAP) – an ongoing program in and around the Annapurna Region. Before ACAP came in, the region was infamous for its what was known as "toilet paper trail." Then, says Dr. Gurung, only 14,000 tourists visited the region in a year and yet the natural environment of the area was spoiled. "Today above 70,000 tourists visit the area annually and still tourism has become sustainable there. It is this experience that we are going to adapt to the rural tourism project."

The concept has already been tested elsewhere within the country. UNDP itself had supported a project called Partnership for Quality Tourism – earlier based in Shyabru and later in Thulo Shyabru in Langtang region — that started in 1994 and folded up some two years ago. The project had programs like lodge and rubbish pitch management, hygienic sanitation, among others.

But, there have been some bad lessons as well. After the completion of the project, the tourism-situation in these villages in Langtang areas have almost gone back to square zero, informed sources say. Shyabru village, where the project was implemented initially, started showing degradation no sooner after the project site was shifted to Thulo Shyabru.

"Such project-sites should be monitored for long time even if the project duration is over, or else the impact of the programs simply fizzle out," says Gurung. The new rural tourism project will be implemented with the partnership among the government, UNDP, SNV and Nepal Tourism Board. Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation will review the Tourism Policy for Rural Poverty Alleviation in the near future.

Quake risk management stressed

Kathmandu, July 5 (RSS):Hotel Association of Nepal (HAN) in collaboration with National Seismological Centre (NSC), Department of Mines and Geology and National Society for Earthquake Technology organised a daylong talk programme on "Earthquake risk management" here today.

HAN members, tourism entrepreneurs and concerned officials of His Majesty’s Government attended the programme.

Opening the talk programme, HAN president Narendra Bajracharya expressed committment of HAN towards guest safety and shed light on the action plan developed by HAN safety, hygiene and security committee.

He also highlighted the future programme of HAN towards the enhancement of hospitality industry.

NSC representative Jerome Laffon highlighted basic fundamentals of earthquake such as historical world, seismology and tectonic plates, geotechtonics of Nepal region, earthquake mechanism, magnitude, intensity and ground motions.

Representative of National Society for Earthquake Technology Amod Dixit shed light on earthquake risk in Nepal, consequences and risk management.

R. Shaw, Ms. Nakagawa and Mrs. Watanabe made a joint presentation on the impact of earthquake on tourism environment and presented a case study on the Kobe earthquake in Japan.

Chairman of HAN safety, hygiene and security committee Richard Launay shed light on the earthquake safety action for hotels as well as the newly introduced earthquake safety notice.

An interaction between the guest speakers and the audience was also held on the occasion.

Petition filed against verdict

Kathmandu, July 5 (RSS): Rajendra Prakash Lohani filed a writ petition at Supreme Court today appealing the verdict of the election tribunal of the Appellate Court, Patan arguing that the recent court decision on general elections results of Nuwakot district constituency No. 1 is illegal.

The plaintiff has argued that since the verdict clearly states that Rajendra Prakash Lohani was ahead of Dr. Prakash Chandra Lohani by two votes by bagging 11,488 votes against 11,486 votes, the court decision that shows 11,483 votes in favour of him and 11,484 in favour of Dr. Lohani is faulty.

There is no legal system or process that allows votes to be kept under notice, cancellation of votes has been made with the intention of defeating the plaintiff Lohani and the act of keeping votes outside notice which should have been kept under notice influenced the decision, he argues.

The plaintiff also argued that since the election tribunal was not formed on the recommendation of Judicial Council, its formation is against the Constitution.

Another petition has also been filed at the Supreme Court seeking an interim order in the name of the election tribunal, the Parliament Secretariate and the Speaker requiring them not to do any work or not to let others do anything on the basis of the appellate court’s decision.

In the last general elections, Rajendra Prakash Lohani was declared winner with 15 votes more by bagging 11,786 votes.