KATHMANDU, June 16: An expert on federal fiscal system has called for adequate financial resources to the local level to abet the zeal of the people's representatives and the people for development at local level.
Dr Khim Lal Devkota, an analyst on fiscal federalism and local self-governance, in a memorandum to Speaker Onsari Gharti, urged for managing the adequate means and resources for the local level as it cannot carry out works related to development and the delivering services to the people without sufficient financial resources.
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Constitutionally, the responsibility for more than half the works being currently carried out by the government has been transferred to the province and local level, Dr. Devkota stated in the memo, urging the Legislature-Parliament not to forget the universal principle that the fiscal sources should also be transferred along with the shifting of responsibility.
Three bills empowering the local level with financial sources have been registered in parliament. These include the National Natural Resources and Fiscal Commission Bill, the Inter-Government Fiscal Management Bill and the Local Level Governance Operation Bill.
"A cursory reading of the draft of these bills made available by the related ministries shows that these have been formulated in a manner to impose maximum restraint and complications in the financial source of the local level. The bills' drafts contain provisions in which the fiscal sources to the local levels is going to be less than what they had been getting in the past. For instance, the local bodies used to get revenue up to 50 percent in electricity royalty sharing whereas the proposed Inter-Government Fiscal Management Bill proposes only five percent royalty to local level," Dr. Devkota has pointed out in the memorandum. RSS
