On/Off the Record

By P.R. Pradhan Corruption has become the lifeline and culture of the present “loktantra”, although, the corruption practice was institutionalized immediately after the 1990 political change or say since Girija Prasad Koirala became the prime minister. Those leaders, who were practising socialism, were sidelined from mainstream politics. Nepali Congress leader Ramhari Joshi got a chance to become the minister but could not enjoy power for a long time. He was like a sage and didn’t fit in the changed context of the corrupt politics. Another leader, Pradeep Giri never became a minister. Once, Giri publicly disclosed that the then prime minister Girija Prasad Koirala asked him to arrange several hundred thousand rupees to become a minister, hence, the former declined the ministerial post. Koirala spoiled the then-Royal Nepal Airlines Corporation. Koirala’s close confidants, Mahesh Acharya and also Ramsharan Mahat sold many of the government undertakings at very low prices and enjoyed a hefty amount of money as commission. Every time, when Koirala became the prime minister, he gave the responsibility to some confidant leaders to collect money through any means. Jayaprakash Gupta, Khum Bahadur Khadka, Govindaraj Joshi, and Bijaya Gachhadar, among others, were the leaders who were assigned to collect money. They all faced corruption charges and were punished, even though, Koirala escaped from corruption charges. Koirala introduced and institutionalized the political level corruption and then other political parties also followed the same practice. Overnight, those leaders in slippers became multimillionaires and constructed luxury buildings in Kathmandu without any source of income. Today, “Loktantra” has become synonymous with “loot-tantra”. To escape possible investigation into corruption, the political leaders are practising policy-level corruption by taking controversial decisions from the meetings of the cabinet of ministers. When the government assigns the chief and other members to the Commission for Investigation on Abuse of Authority, the concerned political parties choose their confidant as the chief and other members. The agency for curbing corruption, CIAA, thus, is unable to catch big fish. The House of Representatives is not interested in introducing a strong law for curbing corruption. An interesting debate is on at present. The leaders from major political parties are advocating for setting a limit of five years in filing the case against corruption. It means any corruption case opened after five years will automatically be dismissed. This idea has been brought not to curb but to encourage corruption. Every year, the Auditor General’s Office issues a report and the amount of arrears is increasing alarmingly. The concerned authorities are reluctant to take action against those who are violating the government rules and regulations and reducing the arrears. The economy is the backbone of a nation. As the government has introduced an expensive system of federalism, it has to manage around 40 thousand people-elected representatives and their advisors and aides from the government coffer. Increased expenditure has seriously affected the development sector budget and also the country’s debt burden has inclined to an alarming level. Just in five years, the debt burden has been doubled. At a time when all sectors have been ruined, the standard of those people in politics has become prosperous. Thieves will never introduce a law from which they could be punished or jailed. The same thing applies to Nepal’s parliament. The parliament is not eager to introduce a law which could be a threat to the very parliamentarians. The conclusion is that without curbing corruption, we cannot make the country prosperous and our economy strong. Our leaders still believe that foreigners will come to make us prosperous, which is totally wrong. Therefore, we should introduce a political system sustainable for our economy and we should control corruption to improve our financial structure. We have to cut off unnecessary expenditures; we should slash the number of local municipalities; we have to remove the district coordination committees and provincial structures; we have to stop recruiting advisors, experts and aides; we should slash the size of the House of Representatives and scrap the system of proportional election. Finally, the present political system should be replaced by the 1990 constitution.