There can be no argument that genuine programs that fulfill health, educational, nutritional and other development aspirations of the people should get support from the state. But those should be pledged in a responsible manner and through accountable mechanisms. No doubt, budget formulation period is the most appropriate time for the local stakeholders to push for the inclusion of such projects in national level developmental plans. It is also a harsh reality that the government cannot include all the programs and allocate budget for all of them.
After all, ours is a resource-strapped country, whose revenue is just enough to meet the recurrent budget. This is where the prioritization becomes important. Now if the leaders feel the existing budget formulation process has not been successfully accommodating public aspirations, they should reform it, instead of resorting to doleouts from the back door.
Our decades-old development efforts, which has unfortunately failed to live up to the expectation of the general people, has taught us great lessons. If we are to succeed on the development front, the state should make local bodies accommodative and accountable. The government, on the other hand, should focus only on large scale national projects. This realization, however, is only a recent phenomenon and is just being incorporated in the national budget. Mid-Hills Highway, which can uplift socio-economic status of millions of people living along the central hills, Sikta Irrigation and Bheri Babai Diversion, Kathmandu-Tarai Fast Track Road and 2nd international airport are some of the projects designed in this line.
Hence, instead of dispersing the available resources, the focus of the government and leaders at this juncture should be on the performance of these national priority projects. Such focus is invisible so far. Spending of just around 5 percent of the allocated capital budget over the first four months of the fiscal year proves just that. Hence, we urge the government to set its priorities right. It must reorient itself to serve Nepalis at large and not concentrate on serving its cadres only. We urge the government to identify constraints hindering development works and remove them aggressively. Only this will deliver justice to the people.
Related story
Ministers ask millions in unbudgeted doleouts
