Nepal

KATHMANDU, SEPTEMBER 3

The probe panel led by Ram Narayan Bidari, chair of Delegated Legislation and Government Assurance Committee, today sent its report to Speaker Krishna Bahadur Mahara on 11-vechicles procurement at the Parliament Secretariat stating that there were technical problems, but they didn&t find any financial irregularity during procurement.

At the end of the last fiscal, the Parliament Secretariat had bought 11 Scorpio vehicles for the chairs of the panels of HoR and NA. The cost of the procurement was more than Rs 60 million. The chairs of the panels started using the vehicles from the fourth week of July. From the first day, there were technical problems in the vehicles.

Talking to mediapersons, Bidari said the panel had called engineers and experts from the Public Procurement Monitoring Office. &There were different problems in each vehicle, but the procurement process didn&t show any irregularities,& he said, adding that of all the vehicles, only three vehicles had serious problems. However, Bidari added that he had bought two vehicles in his life at discount, but he didn&t find any such discounts while buying more than a dozen vehicles.

&I don&t understand why there was no discount,& he added.

After complaints from the chairs, Speaker Krishna Bahadur Mahara on August 12 had formed a five-member probe panel, chairs of five committees of the House of Representatives and National Assembly committees jointly, to investigate procurement irregularities in 11 vehicles.

Four other members of the committee were Bharat Kumar Shah, chair of the Public Account Committee, and Krishna Bhakta Pokharel, chair of Law, Justice and Human Rights committee, Krishna Prasad Dahal, chair of Finance committee and Tara Devi Bhatta, chair of National Sustainable Development and Good Governance Committee.

However, today, Shah was not present during the report handover programme.

Bidari told mediapersons that they had called all the chairpersons of the committees who had been using the new vehicles, but three chairpersons were not present at the meeting for their views. The committee also called the company chair and other members during the investigation.

After receiving the report, Speaker Mahara told mediapersons that he would go through the report and come to a conclusion after some days. &First, I need to read to make final decision,& he added.

Probe committee head Bidari said the panel had recommended in the report that those vehicles, which had technical problems, should be maintained by the company and sent back within seven days. He added, &If the company hesitate to tackle the technical problems, the Parliament Secretariat should move ahead with legal action.&

The Ministry of Finance had provided Rs 60 lakh each for Scorpio vehicles and the PS has bought one vehicle for around Rs 55 lakh to Rs 58 lakh.

&If you travel in the vehicle, you feel like the parts of the vehicles are different.

They are assembled from different companies. If you open a window, it makes a big noise. If you start it, the engine makes a big noise and if you press the brake, you will be scared,& Bidari explained.

The vehicles were procured by the Vehicle Division of the PS. The division had previously procured five Scorpio vehicles, which are working properly. But the recently procured vehicles have technical problems. A vehicle which was obtained by Chair of State Affairs and Good Governance Committee Shashi Shrestha has problem with the gear box, whereas the vehicle which was obtained by Bidari has problem with the chassis.

According to the PS, there are 47 vehicles in the Parliament. Of them, 42 are Scorpio jeeps.

The post Technical problems, but no irregularities: Panel appeared first on The Himalayan Times.

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Some govt offices have not made proactive disclosure for the last nine months

Kathmandu, September 2

Government bodies are bound to update and publish information related to their structures, functions, and details of financial transactions, income and expenditure which is also known as proactive disclosure, yet many of the government bodies are not complying with this provision of the Right to Information Act.

Executive Director of Freedom Forum Taranath Dahal said some government offices had not made proactive disclosure for the last nine months. He said the government bodies had started to publish details of the bills they were supposed to reimburse in a few days, but most of them were not continuing the practice. &This provision is designed to make procurement and financial transactions of public bodies transparent because the public can lodge complaints if they think a government body responsible for reimbursing bills should scrutinise the process more,& Dahal added.

Information Commissioner KiranPokharel said lack of punitive provisions in the existing Right to Information Act for not making proactive disclosure could be a major reason whygovernment offices were not making proactive disclosure on a regular basis.

&Under RTI Act, a concerned authority can be punished for not providing information to a petitioner, but there is no provision for punishment if any public body does not make proactive disclosure,& Pokharel added.

He said his office had recommended that the government amend the RTI Act to compel concerned authorities to make proactive disclosure of information related to their offices three months ago.

Pokharel said government ministries and departments started making proactive disclosure after his office wrote to them a few years ago, but most of the government offices had not yet started doing that. &Only about 30 per cent government offices have started making such disclosures. Government offices based in districts have very poor record of making such disclosure.&

Pokharel said some of the government offices and ministries were making proactive disclosure but they were still not including all the required information in the documents.

He said the idea behind making it mandatory for government bodies to make proactive disclosure was to ensure that government bodies should deem it their duty to disseminate information that could benefit the public and they should not wait till somebody filed a petition under the RTI Act.

As per the RTI Act, government offices are supposed to make proactive disclosure every three months.

The post Govt bodies not complying with RTI Act provision appeared first on The Himalayan Times.

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