Kathmandu, May 8: Minister
for Finance Dr. Yuba Raj Khatiwada on Wednesday assured that no 'populist'
programmes or projects without proper resource backup.
"Budget of the coming fiscal will give priority to the long term
sustainable development and prosperity so the projects and programmes will be
planned to fulfill the objectives," he said while speaking at the Finance
Committee of the Parliament.
However, he didn't deny the inclusion of populist programmes in the
budget of the coming fiscal year 2019/20, and said that without resource
guarantee problems would arise during programme implementation.
Responding to the demand of the lawmakers elected from the proportional
representation system to allocate budget for them as the directly elected
parliamentarians, Dr. Khatiwada said that the money could not be given to them.
He said that the budget was allocated to the Local Infrastructure
Development Partnership Programme and not given to the lawmakers directly.
A committee including the federal and provincial lawmakers of the
respective election constituency and representatives of the local governments
takes decision about the programme and budget allocation as per the bylaws
formulated by the Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration
(MoFAGA).
The bylaws has strict provision that the money allocated to the LIDPA
can only be spent on 9 specific areas that contribute to infrastructure
development and employment generation.
"The money is not given to the lawmakers but allocated to the
respective election constituency. I urge the lawmakers elected from the
proportional representative system not to take it as a programme to distribute
money to the representatives," said the Finance Minister.
Former Prime Minister Dr. Baburam Bhattarai urged the Finance Minister
to be practical and realistic while allocating resources to the programmes.
"Dare to be unpopular. The budget should be the combination of
political slogans and economic reality," he said.
Meanwhile, the Finance Committee has recommended the government to
consider the demographic factor while allocating the budget to the local
bodies.
After conducting discussions with various local governments regarding
the budget of the federal and provincial government, the committee asked both
the government to be more objective and consider the population as well as the
geographical condition while allocating the resources.
"Local governments have complained that a large part of the budget
goes to the federal government. Current practice must be revisited," said
a report of the committee.
It also suggested identifying game changer projects in each province and
allocate additional budget to the provinces that are lagging behind in economic
and human development index.
Published in The Rising Nepal daily on 9 May 2019.
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