MINISTER URGES LOCAL ELECTIONS FOLLOWING CIAA DIRECTIVE

FOLLOWING CIAA VERDICT, MINISTER URGES LOCAL ELECTIONS
Kathmandu, 26 Dec.: Minister for Local Development Top Bahadur Rayamajhi has underlined the need to elect the people's representatives in order to control corruption in local bodies as a result of the provision of all party political mechanism in local level.
At an interaction programme organised here on Monday by the Political Science Students Association of Nepal (POLSAN), Minister Rayamajhi said that the political mechanism in most of the local bodies are not performing up to the mark despite good practices in some of the areas.
Saying that the recent directive issued by the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) has cleared the way for local elections, he further said that political consensus will be a key to resolve the problem.
The Minister also said that he has directed the local bodies' employees on deputation to return to their working stations. He also said that he has initiated new secretary recruitment process for the VDCs and put the process of monitoring of VDC works in place.
CPN-UML standing committee member, Bharat Mohan Adhikari said election is crucial to make powerful local bodies.
Nepali Congress (NC) central member Arjun Narsingh KC said that there is no alternative to local elections to take the country to economic development and lasting peace by transforming conflict. However, he said that holding local elections within five months is impossible as the tasks of peace and constitution-making are yet to be completed.
Nnnn
SUPREME COURT ORDERS REVIEW OF BAIL DEPOSIT IN DARFUR SCAM
Kathmandu, 26 Dec.: The Supreme Court on Monday issued a directive to review the bail deposited by 12 of 36 police personnel implicated in the Darfur scam involving irregularities in the purchase of armoured personnel carriers for Nepal Police.,
RSS reports.
A joint bench of Supreme Court Justices, Tahir Ali Ansari and Gyanendra Bahadur Karki issued the directive against the Special Court decision on the Darfur corruption case filed by Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) on June 7, 2011.
As per the directive, former IGP Hem Bahadur Gurung needs to deposit bail equivalent to Rs 20 million, while Ramesh Chandra Thakuri will have to deposit Rs 70 million, SSP Shiva Lamichhane Rs 2 million and former SI Niraj Pun half million.
Similarly, police inspectors- Arjun Prasad Lamichhane and Giridhari Sharma, DSP Ram Krishna Rajbhandhari, SP Gupta Bahadur Shrestha, SSP Ramesh Kumar Pande, police inspector Lal Govinda Shrestha and Ajit Kumar Saha need to deposit Rs 200,000 each.
With this directive, Shambhu Bharati, an aide to the contractor, has to deposit Rs 8 million as bail amount.
nnnn