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CIAA cans budgets for new projects
KATHMANDU, JUN 26 -
The Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) has halted the transfer of budget for new projects under three programmes after finding that these projects were created to serve the interest of ministers, lawmakers and politicians. The anti-graft body has halted new projects under National Planning Commission (NPC), Ministry of Local Development (MoLD) and Ministry of Physical Planning and Works (MoPPW).
A high level official at the Ministry of Finance (MoF) said due to the CIAA directive new allocations worth Rs 970 million for these new projects have been stopped. “The CIAA clearly told us not to make any allocation to these new projects and also warned that we may have to face action,” said the MoF official. The CIAA letter tells not to sanction budget for ‘petty’ projects.
Among the programmes under the CIAA scanner are MoLD’s programmes based on people’s participation. A total of Rs 410 million was about to be sanctioned but that was halted after the CIAA directive last week. Under the programme, the MoLD would fund 70 percent of the total cost of the projects identified by the locals who would have to contribute 30 percent on their part. However, the CIAA found that most of projects under this programme were not picked by the local people but by Constituent Assembly members and political leaders.
Another slab of Rs. 150 million under the Special Region Programme under the National Planning Commission (NPC) has also been blocked. The budget allocated under miscellaneous heads would have gone to these projects meant for remote areas, the Karnali region and disadvantaged communities. “We’ve directed not to release the budget for this programme as it appeared that the fund was being planned to be used for pet projects rather than for poverty alleviation,” said a CIAA source. Some lawmakers of the Karnali regions have protested the CIAA directive on these two programmes.
Dev Raj Joshi, CA member from Bajura district representing the Nepali Congress, said that the budget going through the CA members given the absence of any electoral agency at the local level was natural and blocking the fund for the projects in the remote districts was not right. “It is better to spend the development budget instead of reserving it for the government employees’ allowance,” he said. Another CA member Nawaraj Koirala from Kalikot representing the Nepal Workers’ and Peasant Party, supported the CIAA move saying that there was little that parliamentarians could do with the release of budget at the end of the fiscal year.
The MoLD had asked parliamentarians to submit the projects at the end of May without crossing the limit of Rs. 1.2 million for all projects and they submitted their preferred projects recently when the fiscal year is nearing an end.
The CIAA directive also blocked the sanctioning of Rs. 410 million under the Department of Roads saying that budget was being transferred to pet road projects of ministers and lawmakers deviating from other projects. State Minister for Physical Planning and Works, Sanjay Kumar Sah created 142 new projects in his electoral constituency in Dhanusha and sought the approval of the MoF for transfer of budget which the ministry rejected immediately, according to the MoF source.
Recently, the Public Accounts Committee of the parliament summoned Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Physical Planning Works, Bijaya Kumar Gachchhadar about the rising transfer of budget from one head to another and directed him not to do so. Gachchhadar admitted that it is the tendency to allocate more budget in the constituencies of powerful leaders.
Posted on: 2010-06-27 08:11
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