APF TAKES OVER SECURITYRESPONSIBILITY OF FORMER KING FROM NA

APF TAKES OVER SECURITY RESPONSIBILITY OF FORMER KING FROM NA
Kathmandu, 14 April: Government withdrew from Thursday through a government decision a 25-member security contingent of Nepal Army (NA) for former King Gyanendra and his family.
A 50-nember squad of Armed Police Force (APF)
has replaced the NA team.
US VISA FEE INCREASED FROM FRIDAY
Kathmandu, 14 April: USA increased visa effective Friday, US embassy
announced.
The US Department of State called the move an adjustment worldwide.
All immigrant visa processing fees have been deceased as most nonimmigrant
visas were increased, the eabassy in Kathmandu.
Tourist,. business, transit, crew member, student, exchange visitor, and
journalist visas have been increases to $160 from $140..
Those applying for petition-based visas (H, L, O, P, Q, and R) will now
pay $190 instead of $150.and those applying for treaty investor and trader visas
(E) have to pay less-- $270 instead of $390.
Fees for Fiancé (e) visas (K) were reduced from $350 to $240.
Under the immigrant visa category, fees for Immediate Relative and Family Preference Applications have to pay $230 instead of $330,
Employment-Based Applications have to pay $405 instead of $720, Other Immigrant Visa Applicants have to pay $220 instead of $305, Diversity Visa Program Fee is also reduced to $330 from $440.
Applicants for Determining Returning Resident Status have to pay $275 instead of $380, according to the new fee structures.
Old will be applicable to those applying for visas before Thursday (April 12)
Non-immigrant visa applicants who make appointments at Nabil Bank on or after April 13, 2012 will pay the new fee.
"Diversity visa applicants pay the fee at the time of interview. Applicants with interviews before April 13, 2012 will pay the old fee. Applicants with interviews on or after April 13, 2012 will pay the new fee," the statement said..
Nnnn

NEPAL DRUGS REVIVAL IN 6 MONTHS
Kathmandu, 14 April : If everything goes according to plan the state-owned Nepal Drugs Limited, which has remained closed for almost three years, will again start churning out medicines within the next six months, Republica reports.

The financially-troubled pharmaceutical company has already accepted Rs 50 million provided by the Ministry of Finance to facilitate the process of bringing the firm back into operation.

Earlier, the company had refused to take the allocated fund citing it was too little to upgrade and maintain some of the machineries and production facilities. But it had decided to move away from its stance after reviewing its business plan.

As per the new plan, of the amount released by the finance ministry, Rs 20 million will go for covering administrative and salary expenses. “The remaining Rs 30 million would be used in retrofitting the company´s machinery and production units,” Nabin Kumar Jha, general manager of Nepal Drugs, told Republica.

To expedite the refurbishing process, the company is planning to issue a public notice at the end of April or early May calling on interested parties to participate in the bidding of upgrading and maintaining machineries and production facilities.

“This process could take more than five months,” Jha said.

But once it is complete the company will be able to produce Jeevan Jal, an oral rehydration solution, and 10 different types of tablets, names of which have not been finalized yet.

“However, we need at least Rs 10 million extra to purchase raw material,” Jha said, expressing hope that finance ministry would not “act stingy” in releasing additional fund as revenue created from sales of products will be sufficient to cover administrative and salary expenses of at least four months per year.

Nepal Drugs was shut down after the Department of Drugs Administration refused to renew its operating license citing its production standard did not comply with minimum manufacturing standard set by the drugs regulator.

Since then the government has been providing a sum of around Rs 4.2 million per month to cover salary expenses of 279 staff at the company. The government has been trying to reduce this liability by introducing voluntary retirement scheme but the company has demanded Rs 579.1 million to lay off staff, which the finance ministry has said is an “exorbitant amount”.
Nnnn



________________________________________



MoI GOING AHEAD WITH PROPOSAL TO REVIVE SICK INDUSTRIES
Kathmandu, 14 April : Ministry of Industry (MoI), which was instructed two months ago to implement recommendations of a high-level taskforce to revive sick industries, is soon forwarding the stimulation package that the taskforce proposed to the cabinet to get formal authority from the government to implement it, Republica reports.

The ministry is seeking a formal nod from the cabinet to implement the taskforce´s suggestions as it has recommended the government to provide facilities like soft loans, waiver of tax and outstanding loans, something which the ministry has no authority to execute.

And as the Prime Minister´s Office (PMO) instruction to implement the report´s suggestions had come through verbal order, it had lacked legal status and thus, prevented the ministry from taking concrete steps to implement them.

“We are soon forwarding the report, including its suggestions, to the cabinet to get it owned by the government and secure legality to implement it,” Uma Kant Jha, secretary of the MoI told Republica.

The high-level task force on rehabilitation of sick industries, comprising eight members from different stakeholder institutions like National Planning Commission (NPC), Ministry of Finance (MoF) and Nepal Rastra Bank (NRB) had handed over its suggestions to the PMO in September, 2011.

The PMO had instantly endorsed the report and later forwarded it to MoI for implementation.

“We have the verbal instruction to implement it from PMO. But still we will need formal approval from the Cabinet to implement its recommendations,” Jha said.

He disclosed that the ministry has already formed a committee and is working out modalities to implement the report. “We are forwarding the modalities of report implementation to the cabinet as well so that we could get government´s consent on it,” Jha stated.

The ministry feels such a consent is very necessary as the implementation of the report requires better coordination between numerous stakeholders, including banks and other institutions and also various ministries.

Clearly, without the cabinet´s nod, the ministry cannot approach MoF to waive off taxes or request NRB to facilitate loans restructuring or arrange other facilities for the sick industries, as suggested by the taskforce.

“The approval of the cabinet, hence, is crucial for us to communicate with other stakeholders to get the sick industry revival measures implemented,” said Jha. Once the cabinet´s nod comes, he said the ministry would instantly start functioning as coordinating agency on behalf of the sick industries for the execution of revival packages.

However, knowledgeable officials said that implementation of sick industry revival measures will not be as easy because the report that pushed numerous recommendations has not categorically defined or categorized the sick industries.

“What this means is; we still have no criteria to genuinely identify which industry is sick, and what sort of facilities it is entitled to. Without it, the ministry simply cannot make its offer,” said a source.

The high-level taskforce during its study received applications from 26 firms claiming that they are sick industries. “However, we have not taken any decision on whether they are really sick industries,” Jha said.
Nnnn



________________________________________

________________________________________

JUDICIAL REFFORM BONE OF CONTENTION
Kathmandu, 14 April: With the integration of UCPN-Maoist combatants into the Nepali Army, the peace process reached a new height, raising hopes of drafting new Constitution by May 27. Still there are several contentious issues, including the structure of the judiciary, which may create hurdles in the constitution drafting process, Ananta Raj Luitel writes in The Himalayan Times..

Though top leaders and judges dwelt on the issue three weeks ago, overhauling the judiciary still remains a sticking point. “We want to revamp the judiciary because it has failed completely,” Maoist lawmaker Eak Raj Bhandari told The Himalayan Times. According to him, their demand to effect changes in the judiciary is still valid.

On March 26, the leaders and judges discussed the issue but did not reach any compromise. Following the meeting, Chief Justice Khil Raj Regmi publicly called the political leadership to yield ground on their idea for the sake of judicial independence. The Nepal Bar Association and the entire legal community has backed the judges for their stance. “We cannot accept a demand that would break our judicial system,” said Shambhu Thapa, a senior advocate. “The leaders have been raising this issue as their knowledge of our judicial system is half baked,” he added.

The two-year old report of the CA’s Committee on Judicial Structure has proposed that judges should be appointed by a parliamentary committee, final authority to interpret constitution and laws should be vested in a parliamentary committee, all judges should be re-appointed, two-year tenure pre-condition should be set to hold the post of chief justice and chief justice can even be appointed directly from among the lawyers.

Though leaders have compromised with the original idea of the committee to entrust the Constitutional Court with final interpretation of constitution, Bhandari said there is no official agreement among the parties to compromise on the report of the committee. Some of the political parties, including UCPN-M, still want to see their wish reflected in the new constitution, as they think that the judges played politics through its verdicts regarding the tenure of the CA.

“They want to dissolve CA on May 27 even if the constitution is not promulgated just because we floated the idea to reform the judiciary and some judges will lose their chance to be chief justice,” Bhandari claimed. Nevertheless, judges have been opposing even the formation of the Constitutional Court because it may become a rival authority of the apex court thus weakening the supremacy of the judiciary. They think the apex court will lose its grip over other state organs if Constitutional Court is formed.

Thapa claimed that since our judicial system is running under common law system recognising the writ as judge made law, our country cannot shift to the continental legal system that includes Constitutional Court as proposed by the leaders. “This will break and bring a disaster in the whole justice system. The duplication of jurisdiction of the apex court and the Constitutional Court would delay justice delivery.”
nnnn
MAOIST CHIEF’S POLITICS FOR ELITE SAYS PARTY CRITIC
Kathmandu, 14 April: Secretary of the Unified CPN-Maoist CP Gajurel, who is one of the top leaders of the radical group in the party led by senior Vice Chairman Mohan Baidhya, today said that they had been trying to change Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal since five years but to no avail, Tika R.Pradhan writes in The Himalayan Times..

“Since we have come to a conclusion that changing Dahal is not possible, we have decided to form parallel organisations within the party,” Gajurel said. He claimed that the establishment faction led by Dahal has shifted to elite class within the party and therefore it was not possible to change him. “We were compelled to begin class struggle within our own party.”

Gajurel further claimed that Dahal’s (establishment faction) class has already been elevated so they do the politics for the sake of their own elite class and not for the proletariats. However, he said splitting the party would not be beneficial to anyone. “Therefore, we will continue with this enmity for the time being as per the arrangement we have devised.”

He said the radical faction has no option other than protesting their activities and create awareness among the people. “Our party’s official document has stated that the party will go for People’s Federal Republican Constitution, but Chairman has been promoting Federal Democratic Republican Constitution.”

The Unified CPN-Maoist leader said the government’s decision to handover the PLA camps and weapons was not the party’s decision. He said that the party had decided to take both peace process and constitution-drafting process simultaneously. “But the establishment faction forced the PLAs to surrender without having any commitment of the new constitution,” he said. This is not the decision of Central Committee but the decision of the two leaders only.

Leaving everything behind Dahal has been joining hands with the Nepali Congress and CPN-UML, he alleged. “Leadership has left everything. It’s wrong to leave all our agendas. Therefore, we need to raise them once again and move ahead for the drastic change in the country.”

Dahal had claimed that he had only supported the proposal of the Baidhya faction in the party to make Dr Bhattarai the head of the state. “We had proposed Baburam at Dhobighat, but Dahal had signed the anti-national four point deal with Madhesi parties,” he said, adding, “We could support the government if four-point deal was not signed with Madhesi parties.”

Gajurel said Dahal had proposed a national consensus government under Baburam long ago but they had rejected demanding that the four-point agreement be scrapped. It’s not the question of Baburam but the anti-national deal, he said.

Saying that the radical faction has never accused establishment of being agents of intelligence agencies, he said, “We don’t know why they are saying that we have made such accusation.”
nnnn
STALLED RETIREMENT OF MAOIST FIGHTERS RESUMES
Kathmandu, 14 April:- The stalled process of releasing former Maoist combatants opting for volunteer retirement resumed on Friday, giving fresh impetus to the integration process, Kamal Deb Bhattarai reports in The Kathmandu Post with inputs from
Binod Tripathi from Chitwan..
The process, which was stalled following tensions in different camps, resumed after UCPN (Maoist) Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal directed the commanders to expedite it. Hundreds of combatants from various cantonments received cheques and returned home on Friday alone.
The Special Committee teams, which were already in cantonments, were under pressure from the combatants to continue the process. Altogether 9,700 combatants who opted for integration earlier during the regrouping process were offered the voluntary retirement option to limit the number of integration to 6500, the ceiling set by seven-point understanding on November 1.
The process began in Surkhet, Chitwan and Nawalparasi on Friday afternoon but it could not resume in other cantonments due to delayed circulation of information from the Maoist leadership.

On Friday, 280 retiring combatants from the Third Division in Chitwan received cheques. According to Under Secretary Madhu Bilas Pandit, the process will be completed within 4 days.

According to Special Committee Secretariat member Deepak Prakash Bhatta, 139 combatants were released from the Sixth Division in Surkhet on Friday. “Tasks are smoothly moving ahead,” he said.
Meanwhile, the taskforce formed by the Special Committee has decided to hold consultations with top leaders of major parties on Saturday to give final touches on the contentious issues related to integration. The taskforce members claimed they have almost resolved all the contentious issues and will consult with senior leaders of the respective parties on some minor issues. Maoist leader and taskforce member Barsa Man Pun said almost all the issues have been resolved and they will present their proposal at a three-party meet on Saturday.
If the meeting of top leaders approves the proposal prepared by mechanism, the Special Committee meeting would formalise the decision, paving the way for starting the integration process. Despite the decision to hand over weapons and combatants to the Nepal Army, the parties are yet to resolve some technical issues on integration.
The taskforce is trying to find a common ground on the structure of the general directorate, mechanism to select combatants eligible for integration, ranks, period of training and bridging course for combatants. The taskforce included Pun from the Maoist party, Minindra Rijal from the Nepali Congress, Bhim Rawal from the CPN-UML and Jitendra Dev from the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum (Loktantrik).
nnnn