NATIONAL8 (Spotlight Weekly]

Code Of Conduct

Members of parliament discuss ways to furbish their image

By A CORRESPONDENT

After facing mounting criticism from common public, members of Parliament are finally considering to follow a model code of conduct to make their activities transparent and accountable.

Although it is still unclear what type of code of conduct do they want to formulate, members of Parliament have realized that there is a need of certain guidelines to maintain their decorum.

Will a code of conduct bring substantial changes in the behavior of the MP? "Yes," say majority of the legislators. From Prime Minister Krishna Prasad Bhattarai to Speaker of House of Representatives Taranath Ranabhat and former prime minister Surya Bahadur Thapa, all of them hold the view that a code of conduct was necessary describing the role of the lawmakers.

The decline in the image of people's representatives is a recent phenomenon in Nepal. As the mid term-elections of 1994 paved way for a hung parliament, it gave a field day for the legislators to loot from the state coffers. Not only they sanctioned duty free vehicles for themselves, they also formulated laws so as to raise their perks and benefits. And, it was not the end. As changing sides of even a small number of members could make or break the government, several MPs allegedly earned millions of rupees for switching their loyalties overnight. Both the ruling and opposition parties employed money, muscle and even women to lure the legislators.

The issues related to misuse of public money, medical funds and diplomatic passport were widely reported in public media. It was at this time that a group of MPs, with the support from National Democratic Institute (NDI), proposed the idea to formulate a code of conduct for legislators. A code of conduct drafting committee, headed by leader of the main opposition in National Assembly, Yuva Raj Gyawali, has come up with the draft of the code.

"Members of parliament should have some sort of code of conduct as our activities are closely watched by voters," said premier Bhattarai, addressing a seminar organized by Parliament Secretariat with support from NDI. Interestingly, Bhattarai, as a prime minister, had entered into the parliament in the casual dress while the session was on.

During the interaction program, leaders and representatives from prominent political parties expressed views that a code of conduct is necessary to reverse the damage caused by their predecessors.

"We need a code of conduct to undo the deteriorating images of parliament members," said former prime minister Thapa.

Designing code of conduct alone is not adequate to clean the image of members of Parliament. "What is the use of code of conduct in a place where even laws are directly violated," said Daman Nath Dhungana, former Speaker of House of Representatives.

UML leader Pradip Nepal also agreed with Dhungana. "The real question here is how the proposed code of conduct will be implemented when other laws have been ignored," said Nepal.