FRAGILE DISTRICTS, FUTILE DECENTRALISATION

- Harka Gurung

Nepal has long been involved with decentralisation exercise for a better state management. In this, administrative districts constitute a crucial hierarchy in the political and bureaucratic structure. The intent of this paper is to explore the link between the intent (decentralisation) and vital component (district). Section one is a review of decentralisation process along with a note on conceptual clarity. Section two makes an assessment of the economic status of districts. Section three describes central government outreach at the district level. Section four deals with a proposition for consolidating the districts. Finally, are some observations on resource mobilisation for the districts.

1. Decentralisation Exercise

Nepal has gone through a long process of decentralisation. The country's experiment in local institution building goes back to 1919 when a regulation relating to Kathmandu Municipality was promulgated to look after petty judicial cases and town sanitation. In 1930, a Panchayat regulation authorised the establishment of nine village councils in Kathmandu Valley. Officials of the above municipal and village councils were government nominees. The Constitutional Act of Nepal, 1948 was the first one that provided for elected village and district panchayats. The Village Panchayat Act, 1950 had planned to conduct elections throughout the country but was pre-empted by the political turmoil soon after.

Among the various ministries formed after the democratic set-up in 1951, one was the Ministry of Self-government. The Interim Government Act of Nepal, 1952 adopted the ideals of democratic governance with maximum participation of the people. A village development scheme was initiated with the objective to assist villages in planning and implementation of local projects. However, no local institutions could be formed except in some municipalities. In 1954, a Department of Co-operative was established to develop village communities. It was the Administrative Reform Commission, 1957 that devised a hierarchy of organisations for village development. It had five tiers; (1) village panchayat as the base; (2) block of number of villages; (3) sub-division of number of blocks; (4) division above sub-divisions; and (5) district as the overall co-ordinating unit. By 1960, the country had been divided into 150 blocks. The same year, the democratic government was overthrown and replaced by Panchayat system.

The preamble of the Constitution of Nepal, 1962 stated that "The Panchayat system shall be based on the participation of people and decentralisation of power". The country was divided into 75 districts out of existing 35 to provide better service to smaller units. Above the district level were created 14 zones with the objective of having more interactions between geographic regions and social groups. The lowest tier was reorganised into 3,600 village panchayats while those with a population exceeding 10,000 were made into a town Panchayat. A 20-year decentralisation scheme was proposed within the Panchayat structure into three phases (preliminary, transitional and permanent). Proposing that political decentralisation would be ineffective without economic decentralisation, Panchayat Development and Land Tax (PLDT) was introduced as a pilot project in Jhapa (1964).

The Local Administration Act, 1965 authorised Village Panchayats to collect taxes for local development while District Panchayats were to oversee all development activities (Table1). The position of Bada Hakim was replaced by Chief District Officer (CDO) who was also made the secretary of the District Panchayat. Soon after, conflict arose between the District Panchayat (political) and CDO (bureaucracy). The setback to decentralisation commenced in 1971 when Panchayat Development Officer (PDO) was appointed as the secretary of the District Panchayat and the CDO was made the supervisor of law and order as well as development activities.

District Administration Plan, 1974 was introduced to make a break-through in decentralisation. Its thrust was for unified administration to ensure preparation of integrated district plan. The scheme failed due to the reluctance of sectoral ministries to entrust control of their programmes to the CDO. Another effort was made in 1978 through Integrated Panchayat Development Design (IPDD) of a more comprehensive nature. It emphasised people's participation and Ilaka (sub-district) "service centre" as the focal-point for planning and implementation of development activities at the local level. This scheme of District and Village Panchayats as the main institutions for rural development also failed due to the obduracy of line agencies and PLDT was withdrawn in 1979.

Priority given by donors to rural development led to the establishment of the Ministry of Local Development (MLD) in 1980. The post of PDO, that succeeded CDO as the district Panchayat secretary, was designated as Local Development Officer (LDO) with sole responsibility of development activities. The following year saw another tinkering with the merger of Ministry of Panchayat and Ministry of Local Development as MPLD along with the formation of Integrated Rural Development Co-ordination Board. However, the problem of decentralisation as well as co-ordination remained unresolved. Soon after commenced yet another exercise in the form of Decentralisation Act, 1982 which came into effect with Decentralisation Rules, 1984. The Act aimed to give planning and implementation responsibility to local panchayats by making district level offices of sectoral agencies to function as an integral part of District Panchayat secretariat.

Decentralisation has been an incessant theme in Nepal over the last five decades. It has evolved according to the rationale of successive regimes: for cosmetic purposes during the Rana rule, to sustain elite power base during Panchayat period, and for good governance in the present democratic set-up. The past initiatives all foundered on the bedrock of the highly centralised governance system of the country. Even now, there is no evidence that the central government and entrenched bureaucracy are becoming amenable to some form of local autonomy.

The main impetus behind decentralisation efforts has been to enlist people's participation in rural development. The Local Administration Act, 1965 had provision for making local panchayats responsible for planning and implementation. The then Department of Panchayat Development, with USOM help, even prepared a red book of the Malaysian model as a planning manual for each district. In 1966, Ministry of Economic Planing commenced a survey of districts for feasible projects according to the felt needs of the people. The last feasibility survey in this series was reported in 1968 for Rolpa district.

The Decentralisation Act, 1982 and Rules, 1984 entrusted districts the responsibility of preparing annual and periodic plans. In the past, such legal provisions had remained mere procedural formality. However, the inception of Dhading District Development Project in 1983 came as a programmatic support to local-level planning with a substantive content. This district based rural development project had one small project in each of the 450 wards of Dhading and all activities were co-ordinated through the District Panchayat supported by a technical office. The experience of Dhading DDP since has been replicated in Gorkha and Lamjung districts. The project emphasis is on horizontal linkage by facilitating inter-relationship between organisations and beneficiaries as well as intra-relationship between elected, governmental, NGOs and private sector entities.

Participatory planning received further impetus with UNDP involvement in local governance through a series of projects. This commenced with a technical support in 1985, which resulted in Strengthening Decentralisation Planning Project (SDPP) in 1989. With legitimisation of local authorities by democratic parliament in 1992, the SDPP was designated as Decentralisation Support Project (DSP). The project objectives included (1) assistance in implementation of the decentralisation policy, (2) support to districts in planning and monitoring and (3) decentralised development management. In 1995, the DSP was replaced by the Participatory District Development Project (PDDP). The Project aimed at enhancing the capacities of DDCs and VDCs as well as helping them establish linkages with local organisations like line agencies, NGOs and the private sector. Handbooks of good governance and decentralisation were prepared at the VDC level. The most recent initiative has been the promulgation of the Local Self-governance Act, 1999 (LSGA) and related Regulation, 2002. The Act envisions development of districts and other local bodies as vehicles for self-governance system. Many donors are involved in supporting this decentralisation effort in Nepal. These relate to implementation strategy, legal framework, capacity building, accountability and participatory planning. Although revenue sharing is discussed, there has been no analysis of financial resource base of local bodies. In fact, the share of local governments in the national budget declined from 3.91 percent in 1998/99 to 3.64 percent in 1999/2000 and 3.06 percent in 2000/2001 despite the rhetoric of decentralisation. Therefore, section two makes a brief exploration of this aspect at the district level.

There is need for conceptual clarity on the forms and functions in the decentralisation process. Delegation, deconcentration and devolution are not evolutionary stages but discrete forms. Delegation and deconcentralition are basically related to exercise of administrative authority in which the lower hierarchies are allowed tenancy. Devolution, on the other hand, is related to political authority including autonomy in local governance. Unlike delegation, whereby functions are assigned, devolution involves exercise and sharing of power. Power sharing is contingent on the relative strength of the contending parties. In the case of Nepal, the centre is too pervasive and the districts too weak without economic viability.

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