DEATH TOLL IN SETU FLASH FLOOD INCREASES TO 26 Kathmandu, 9 May: Five more bodies were recovered by search teams from Seti river Tuesday raising the death toll in Saturday’s flash floods to 26. More than 40 others are still missing .including three tourists from Ukraine. Bodies of 19 persons have been identified and handed over to loved ones. Severed body parts have also been recovered. Nnnn NC PICKS 3 MORE GOVT. TEAM MEMBERS Kathmandu, 9 May: The Nepali Congress has 'finalised' the names of leaders to be sent as ministers to the Baburam Bhattarai-led unity government, according to sources close to party president Sushil Koirala, Arjun Paudel writes in The Kathmandu Post. The names picked and proposed by Koirala include Gopal Pahadi, Padamnarayan Chaudhary and Chitra Lekha Yadav. Of the six ministerial berths allocated to the Congress, two candidates--Krishna Prasad Sitaula and Suryaman Gurung--have already been sworn in as ministers. With the new names "finalised," a single candidate remains to be picked from the party. Sources said the last candidate will also be picked as soon as the Sher Bahadur Deuba faction of the party proposes one. Though Koirala and Deuba are not having any one-on-one talks and meetings of late, attempts are being made by other senior leaders of the party to bring about a thaw in the two senior leaders' strained relations. The party's vice president, Ram Chandra Poudel, and party general secretary Prakash Man Singh have been asked to negotiate with the Deuba faction and persuade the leaders to join the government, sources said. Of the three new candidates, Padamnarayan Chaudhary and Chitralekha Yadav are from Siraha, while Gopal Pahadi is from Sankhuwasabha. Pahadi and Chaudhary were nominated in the Central Working Committee by Koirala. In the party's 12th General Convention, Chaudhary from the Koirala panel and Yadav from the Deuba panel were contestants for the party treasurer's post, while Yadav had defeated Chaudhary. While Pahadi and Chaudhary are considered key figures in Koirala's coterie, Yadav is said to be close to leader Khum Bahadur Khadka. Pahadi is known as someone who provides feedback to Koirala in every political decision he takes. Though a dedicated leader, sources say he has a weak political base in terms of people's support. Chaudhary, representing the Madhes community, has his own importance in the Koirala coterie in terms of current inclusive politics and his "reliability." A female candidate and belonging to the Madhes, Yadav is equally significant in the current political context in the Congress circle, while she also has a sound political image and background. "All these proposed candidates are esteemed to be very honest and dedicated leaders in our party and I don't think the candidates picked by the president himself will be opposed by anyone," a source said. nnnn Publication : PAC DURECTS UTHEP TO CLEAR HURDLES IN ONE WEEK Kathmandu, 9 May: The parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) on Tuesday directed the authorities concerned to clear all the hassles delaying the construction of the 456-MW Upper Tamakoshi Hydro Electricity Project (UTHEP) within seven Days, The Kathmandu Post reports. Estimated to cost Rs 35.29 billion, it is the biggest hydropower project commissioned through mobilisation of the country’s indigenous capital. The government, financial institutions and public enterprises, including Nepal Telecom, Employees Provident Fund, Rastriya Beema Sansthan, and Citizen Investment Trust have pledged investment in the project. The project works have been affected due to delay in the UTHEP board meeting, which has not taken place since February 23. The Nepal Electricity Authority has recently appointed Sunil Kumar Dhungel as the project director, but the board is yet to approve him as a director. The PAC has directed the board chairman to call a board of directors’ meeting within seven days and expedite the projects as per the planned schedule. Expected to be complete by March 2015, the works on one of the country’s most prioritised projects have, however, been obstructed owing to various factors. Officials and shareholders of the project said that the delay in board meeting has created funding problems with the board unable to approve the funding to the contractors. Facing a disturbing trend of project directors being appointed and ousted, the project lacks a much-needed stability. Hari Ram Koirala, secretary at the Energy Ministry, admitted that delay in the board meeting has affected the project. “It has stalled the progress in the construction of a tunnel. It would be a big challenge to meet the target on tunnel construction this fiscal year,” he said. According to him, the project had set a target to complete a 4km of tunnel by the end of this fiscal year, but the progress so far has been discouraging—achieving only 2.4km so far. Koirala, however, assured the PAC that the MoE would make an effort to remove the ongoing distrust between the ministry and the project. nnnn SAC TELLL GOVT. TO HALT NA RESTRUCTURING Kathmandu, 9 May: Parliamentary State Affairs Committee (SAC) on Tuesday unanimously directed the government to put on hold its proposal to restructure the Nepal Army (NA), Kosh Raj Koirala writes in Repulica. A closed door meeting of the SAC at Singha Durbar issued the directive saying internal restructuring of the national army was related with Article 144 (3) of the Interim Constitution and Article 4 (7) of the Comprehensive Peace Accord. The decision states there should be consensus among political parties before institutional reform of the NA as per the provision set in the Interim Constitution. Article 4 (7) of the CPA likewise states that the cabinet would prepare and implement detailed action plan of democratization of the NA, including determination of the right number of the Nepali Army, by taking suggestions from the concerned committee of the interim parliament. The meeting categorically directed the prime minister and defense minister not to take any decision on the issue before the SAC gives a final decision after detailed study of Office and Mangement (O &M) Survey and army´s democratization proposal, among other things. ““We have directed the government to provide copies of army´s democratization proposal, O&M Survey and the research, if any, conducted by National Security Council for detailed studies,” said SAC Chairman Ram Nath Dhakal. The proposal floated by the NA plans to create posts of two Lieutenant Generals, six Major Generals, 10 Brigadier Generals, 14 Colonels and 50 Lieutenant Colonels as a part of the internal restructuring of the NA. Nearly 4,000 officer level posts will be created in the army once the restructuring plan comes into effect. It is estimated that the creation of senior positions in the army will cost the government an additional Rs 120.5 million a year. During the SAC meeting on Monday, Prime Minister Baburam Bhattarai, who also holds the portfolio of Defense Ministry, had argued that internal restructuring was necessary as the army´s strength had grown from 18,000 to over 92,000 in 47 years when the last restructuring was carried out. However, Nepali Congress (NC), CPN-UML and leaders close to Baidya faction of the Maoists are against the internal restructuring plan, at least for now. Dr Prakash Sharan Mahat, Purna Bahadur Khadka, Jagadish Narasingh KC of NC and Bishnu Paudel of the UML and Pampha Bhusal of the UCPN (Maoist), among others, were against the restructuring plan without a detailed study. According a participant in the meeting, UML leader Paudel, who was the defense minister in Madhav Kumar Nepal-led government, said that he had decided to put the NA´s proposal on hold as its conflicts with provisions of the Interim Constitution. "There must be political consensus among all parties to implement any kind of internal restructuring in the army,” the participant quoted Paudel as saying. Likewise, Maoist lawmaker Bhusal had argued that a plan was not relevant in the wake of suggestions coming from various quarters to right sizing the army. Nnnn TRADE POLICY EXPERT WING IN MoCS Kathmandu, 9 May: Acknowledging the fact that handling issues related to trade and its dynamism is beyond the capacity of civil servants, government has decided to set up Trade Policy Analytical Wing (TPAW) in the Ministry of Commerce and Supplies (MoCS), Republica reports. The wing comprising experts on trade policy and development will support the World Trade Organization (WTO) division and trade related issues at the MoCS. “Analyzing the trade issues and policies is definitely beyond the capacity of administrative staffs,” Toya Narayan Gyawali, joint secretary of the ministry said. “It was decided to establish the TPAW in order to fill that gap.” According to Gyawali, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has agreed to assist the ministry in this regard. “The wing will be completely under the WTO division of the ministry,” he said, “The purpose of establishing the wing is to be more efficient and prepare ourselves for bilateral and multilateral negotiation.” Nepal which became a WTO member in 2004 has no such body in the ministry till the date. Referring to the frequent transfer of the staffs in the ministry, Gyawali said, “The wing of experts will always be there to support anyone that comes to work here.” The wing will have a maximum of 3 people, according to Gyawali. Government prepared a Nepal Trade Integration Strategy (NTIS) 2010 -- a blueprint to boost the country´s export -- is looking forward to various bilateral and multilateral trade talks in different forums. “We also need feedback from experts to know the trend of global trade before sitting for negotiations with different countries and agencies,” said Gyawali, who is also the chief of the WTO division. “Wing´s main responsibility will be to make a sound base for negotiation and provide feedback for decision making.” The government is preparing to have regular bilateral talk with countries like the US, China and Bangladesh in the near future. “The wing will be established now in the temporary basis,” Gyawali said, “We might think of making it a permanent body of the ministry after some time.” The government has completed the trade policy review of the country under WTO norms in March. Nnnn