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MoF bid to slash foreign junkets
KATHMANDU, JUN 03 -
The Ministry of Finance (MoF) has asked all the government ministries and departments to scale down the number of foreign visits and delegates warning them that visits other than mandatory ones would not be paid for.
The MoF move beginning last week is aimed at maintaining financial austerity and checking the flow of foreign junkets of top government officials including ministers and bureaucrats.
The budget allocated for foreign visits for the whole year was spent within less than six months of the current fiscal year.
The message circulated maintains that it was necessary to rid the government of excessive financial burden caused by such visits. “Only the visits essential for mustering bilateral and multilateral relations of Nepal will be allowed at the government’s expense,” the circular reads. The MoF has also asked agencies concerned to limit the number of delegates to three. The directive, however, is lenient with sponsored visits.
“Half a dozen secretaries from various ministries are in a foreign junket while Minister for Health Uma Kanta Chaudary and Minister for Labour and Transport Management Md. Aftab Alam are planning trips,” sources said.
“This is to reduce unnecessary financial burden on the state coffers. The recurrent expenditure is soaring due to such delegations,” Revenue Secretary Krishna Hari Baskota said.
The circular has also prescribed the duration of a ‘mandatory visit’. “No official shall spend more than a week abroad,” officials said.
Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal has been repeatedly directing his cabinet colleagues and secretaries to reduce their domestic and foreign visits.
The latest move has been perceived as a last-ditch effort to tame the malpractice.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, authorised to regulate foreign visits, is said to have permitted political trips under pressure, crossing the limits set by the directives in some instances.
Posted on: 2010-06-04 08:26
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