Acts Of New Government
Positive Impression

By Mukti Rijal

THE new government in a short span of time has given an impression that what really matters to it is public concern. Though it approved the proposal of the Nepal Oil Corporation to escalate prices of the POL products the decision was taken weighing all pros and cons. The prices of kerosene and diesel have not been revised upward as these are used by the ordinary people in general whereas petrol and LPG have become slightly costlier. The government did act tough on the hoarders and scarcity inducers when those bent on minting money taking advantage of the crisis unleashed the panic among the ordinary people.

Revision

The kind of difficulties people used to take on in the past in such critical times of artificial crisis did not repeat. For two to three days people were harassed as the hoarders acted deceptively to hide the POL products from the market. As the government started to cracking down on the artificial scarcity inducers, not all dared to play havoc on the interest of the consumers. However, one needs to take note of the way how the situation for the artificial shortage was created. It was almost more than a month before that the Nepal Oil Corporation broached the news that it was facing the financial shortfalls and the only way out to cope with crunch is the upward revision of the prices. This, indeed, gave much needed clues for the blackmarketeers and hoarders to plan to take advantage of the situation.

Why did the Nepal Oil Corporation leak out such an information to the market to let the blackmarketeers and unfair traders exploit the situation needs to be investigated. There are complaints raised time and again about inefficiency and mismanagement inside the Corporation. But no investigation was carried out to examine if the public concerns regarding the performance of the corporation were genuine or not.

This time the government has formed a body to investigate into the affairs of the Corporation and report to the government soon. This step is a very appropriate one . But there are some caveats as well. There is a general built inlethargy to implement the recommendations of the panel. This time it is expected that the past tendency will not get repeated.

The monopoly of the service provider and dominance of a single suppler of the goods and articles creates problems in the market. This situation needs to be seriously looked into and the other service providers enter and compete. Recently the government of India has decided to dismantle the monopoly of the Indian Oil Corporation so that its monopoly could be checked. Nepal should also take steps towards giving space for other service providers and suppliers as a result of which the difficulties the government has to encounter and act on behalf of the public sector entities could be minimised.
Another very important measure the government has announced is relating to the improvement of the health service delivery. The new health minister himself is a reputed medical profession and renowned surgeon who knows about the problems health sector is facing . It is to be noted that the public health provisions in Nepal have not been able to cater to the needs of the people. Hospitals at the district, health posts and health centres in the villages are ill equipped. They have neither medicines nor health professions to provide services to the people. Doctors and physicians concentrate in the urban areas and run their clinics and nursing homes. The health service has been commercialised. Ordinary people have not been able to afford the cost intensive services provided by the private sectors. The public health service institutions are almost at disarray.The new Health Minister has talked of several measures to bring about an improvement in the situation. He has talked of the health insurance scheme and other measures that would introduce elements of ethics and honesty in the medical profession. The doctors as they are more interested in taking benefits of the opportunities available in the urban areas resist the idea of going to the remote areas and serving the needy people. The new provision that requires doctors and health professions to go the rural areas and serve the people will definitely make positive dent in the situation.

Need

The governments in the past committed to bring about changes in heath service delivery but failed. There was a wide gap between what was promised and what was actually delivered to the people. It is expected that the new government as it is made up of the people who are experts and knowledgeable in their respective areas will prove that it is government with difference. At this critical time there is a crying need of performance and delivery to the people. Rhetorics and demagoguery should not repeat.

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