Kathmandu, January 11
The election for the chair of Public Accounts Committee, which was scheduled for Wednesday, has been shelved after opposition from the main opposition, who accused Speaker Onsari Gharti of adding a member to the committee in a bid to influence the poll result.
The CPN-UML pointed that Gharti included Dhruba Bagle from the ruling Nepali Congress after publication of the election schedule. A source said: The UML has taken the inclusion of a more member in the committee after publication of the poll schedule as a means to increase the number of votes for a certain party.
The 51-member committee has 15 CPN-UML members. UML Chief Whip Bhanu Bhakta Dhakal said the UML has taken this as a means to influence the vote for PAC chair.
The prevailing norm is that PAC chair should not be from the ruling parties as the committee is supposed to monitor the government’s activities. Despite this, the then UML-Maoist ruling coalition had not given the position to the then main opposition, NC. At that time, Janardan Sharma from the CPN-Maoist Centre was the PAC chair.
Now, Sharma is Minister for Energy and the position of PAC chair has been lying vacant, affecting the functioning of a panel tasked with investigating corruption in government bodies.
