Political Behaviour & Decentralisation
How Conducive ?

By Mukti Rijal

WORKSHOPS, seminars and deliberations are organised often to discuss decentralisation especially with focus on how the process can be furthered. In fact, the input discussions are important and create critical rational data to examine about how measures for taking decentralisation process forward should be crafted and implemented. Political will and commitment are said to be the preconditions for decentralisation in the context like ours where politics and politicians command influences in several spheres of national life.

Autonomy

Bureaucracy is politics guided and lacks functional autonomy. Similarly, economy suffers from interventions-formal or informal- of the politicians and politics in general. Decentralisation is something that hits or affects politicians directly. It takes away power and influences of politicians and bureaucrats. It divests them of the glamour and command they exercise in both formal and functional terms and vests power and authority in local institutions. The process of divestiture will definitely be slow, deliberate and painless. Decentralisation reduces central influences and interferences in local affairs and limits role of the higher apparatus in most essential spheres of governmental functions. Where politicians fail to restrain from local details and tend to exercise their influences on local affairs, how can decentralisation process be allowed to go further as it hurts the ego of the politicians and power brokers. Our parliamentarians seem not sincere and lack in clear perspectives when we talk of decentralisation and local self governance. They speak rhetorics and indulge in tall talks when they are in the opposition but shift their stance as soon as they take the treasury bench.

Moreover, they harbour the fear that the strong and functional local governments will undercut their role and influence. They fight tooth and nail for their place and role in local government institutions be it DDC or municipality. When the local Self Governance Bill was being discussed in the Parliament some two years ago, lawmakers seemed keen to create place for them. Some lawmakers floated proposals to ensure that the new law gave preeminent place for them in local affairs. Even the concept of parliamentary constituency level mechanism for local development under the chairmanship of the lawmaker concerned was mooted. But this proposal did not carry much support even as lawmakers could lend strong credence to it. Parliamentarians are, however, given place at the DDCs as members and their role is envisaged in district plan formulation and selection.

Parliamentarians get one million rupees for the constituency development programme. The amount was increased to one million in the last annual budget from four hundred thousands rupees they received to allocate for the development of their respective constituencies. Though the government has issued guidelines to govern the allocation and use of the fund, lack of monitoring and evaluation has resulted into poor results. The fund has been politicised severely and used at the beck and call of political functionaries.

Lawmakers using their political muscle in overriding the interests and values of decentralisation is a strong example of the centralised tendencies.

Political parties do resist the initiatives to bind them to a body of democratic rules and regulations. Inner party democracy is a nation which is provided in the constitution of the Kingdom of Nepal. However, political parties are not structured to permit for growth of democratic norms and values, nor they seem ready to practice internal democracy in day to day functions.

The statute of Nepali Congress party gives more authority to the party president at the expense of lower rungs while main opposition party CPN (UML) is yet to dismantle fully the concept of democratic centralism (Janwadi Kendriyata).

Moreover, the initiative with regard to enacting law relating to political parties to require that they operate with due observance of transparency and accountability has not been materialised. There may be some difficult issues to thrash out, but political parties should give priority to enacting the law to demonstrate that they are committed to transparency and good governance within the organisa-tion itself.

Decentralisation is one of the important tenets of good governance which should be reflected in behaviours of political parties as they, in fact, are and can be mandated to run governance of the state. If political parties fail the test of decentralised and democratic culture, governance run under their aegis is bound to be centralised and hypocritic.

Influence

At the present context, local leaders say DDC president cannot act independent of party influence and dictat. Their loyalty to party interests, not local development and governance interests, counts much to curry favour of central leadership. They can ensure their nomination in the local election only if they can show that they are loyal to central leadership. At such a paradox, decentralisation process is bound to suffer in the country. We have a local framework for decentralisation which concedes some room for local self governance. But will substantive decentralisation be achieved with the prevailing political behaviour is a difficult question to note.

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