| diyalo |
Posted
on 22-Mar-02 12:39 AM
Corruption charge filed against Minister Wagle
A corruption charge was filed against Minister for Works and Physical Planning Chiranjibi Wagle at the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) Thursday, CIAA sources said.
Wagle has been taking up the duties of the Prime Minister after Prime Minister Deuba left for neighbouring India on a six-day official visit Wednesday.
Harihar Sharma Pokhrel, resident of Parbat-Khanigaon-3 presently staying at Baghbazar filed the charge against Wagle claiming that the Minister was directly or indirectly involved in the misappropriation carried out during the selection of consultant for the Road Network Development Project.
The project is being carried out under the Ministry with the assistance of the Asian Development Bank and the British donor agency-Department for International Development.
In the complaint, Pokhrel has also demanded that action be taken against Devendra Wagle, son of Minister Wagle, who according to the claimant was involved directly or indirectly in the misappropriation carried out while selecting the consultant for the road project.
Action has also been demanded against the person who was in the sub committee formed by the Ministry for the selection of the consultant.
The American Company Lewisburg, which was selected as the consultant for the project, had its name in the sixth position during the carrying out of preliminary eligibility assessment of all the companies that had submitted their applications for the project.
http://www.nepalnews.com/
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 22-Mar-02 03:09 AM
As someone who voted for Minister Wagle in 1991, but have for the last 8 years actively boycotted his programs and election from Gorkha, as well as severed all forms of contact with him, purely and solely as a form of protest and moral crusade against a litany of his (i.e., my former MP's) unpalatable acts in politics and society, I hope the due legal processes of our land take course to hand him and his son verdicts that they deserve.
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| ashu |
Posted
on 22-Mar-02 08:36 PM
In Nepal, we have this built-in perverse incentive to aid corruption.
Let me give you a small example.
If you want to get a motorcycle ko license, you have to pay, these days, anywhere from Rs. 3000 to Rs. 6000 to the transport authorities (i.e. traffic
police who issue the licenses). If you do that, then, you can even have your liciense home-delivered without your ever having to take a driving test.
This is the truth.
This range of Rs. 3000 to Rs. 6000 is NOT a formal fee per se, but the
money you pay to get your license both faster and easily.
Else, if you do not want to aid corruption: you wait for at least two months or more to take your driving test. But then there is this risk that the examining officer, annoyed that you have not paid him anything extra might just flunk
you anyway, making you re-start the whole application process.
If you don't want to pay the bribe, consider, then, the risks:
a) you might fail the driving test anyway in two months when your turn comes up.
b) you wait for two months or more, and the amount you spend on taxis while waiting for your motor-cycle ko license may be something like:
Rs.100 per day x 60 days (or more) = Rs. 6000 (and more).
Of course, you can wrte letters to editor, complain to proper autorities and so on, but the costs (of time, efforts and money) of doing that are high, if your time
and resources are limited. Besides, you NOT wanting to play this "bribe game"
will have NO deterring effect on the behaviour of others.
Now, consider the perverse scenario: If you had only paid, say, Rs. 4000 in the first place and gotten your license that way, you would have "saved" Rs. 2000 and two months of time.
Given these alternatives, what's going to be a rational person's choice?
Reluctantly, assuming that s/he wants to ride the motorbike to save time
and money, s/he pays the bribe, and drives away.
This is just one small example to make my point.
And my point is this: It's nice to rant and rave against corruption in Nepal. And we Nepalis have been doing that for ages. But let's wise up to the fact that people
are NOT going to be moral by themselves, but what they do is respond to incentives to do certain things and not do certain other things.
So, any attempt of combating corrution in Nepal must start with getting the incentives right.
oohi
ashu
ktm,nepal
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