Lawmakers stress on corruption prevention

Nepali Congress general secretary and lawmaker Gagan Kumar Thapa has demanded investigations against those accused of their roles in the fake Bhutanese refugee scam.

Taking part in deliberations on the government policies and programmes for the upcoming fiscal year 2023-24 in a meeting of the House of Representatives (HoR) today, the leader stressed the need of a thorough probe against all accused and suspected in the scam was essential to discourage corruption and promote good governance.

Commenting over the policies and programmes, the former Minister said policies and programmes did not reflect the Prime Minister's 'vision', advising the government to come up with the concept of 'land bank'.

Guarantee of free quality education and health services would contribute to minimizing corruption, he said.

CPN (UML) leader and lawmaker Gokarna Bista pressed an idea of starting a culture of archiving construction feedback over the policies and programs. As he said, structural reforms are needed to increase domestic economic growth.

Purna Bahadur Ghale said lawmakers' suggestions over the policies and programmes be incorporated in the policy document. "I as the member in the HoR support the government policies and programmes", he said underlining the need of implementing the concept to take diplomatic efforts to launch international flights from Bhairahawa and Pokhara airports and the 'learning by doing' campaign to promote practical learnings.

Rastriya Swatantra Party President and lawmaker Rabi Lamichhane demanded that the government was expected to present a real scenario of the country's existing situation and the high possibility for the least economic growth should be considered while preparing the policies and programmes.

The lawmaker utilised the rostrum to say that big corruption scams happened under a high-level nexus of political leadership and administration. "Money game is still taking place in the fake Bhutanese refugee scam."

The government's fresh policies and programmes lack a clear policy to connect Nepali youths and skilled human resources presently abroad to the cause of economic development. The government was expected to come up with policies and programmes capable of encouraging young foreign migrants to get back to home to explore career opportunities.