Royal government embezzled state fund says finance minister

Kathmandu, May 16 (UNI)The Nepalese Finance Minister Ram Sharan Mahat has alleged that the royal government under King Gyanendra had embezzled with public money by not using it in productive purposes but had incresed public expenditure.

Presenting a white paper here on the embezzlement of funds during the King Gyanendra-led government, he said expenditures of the Royal Palace skyrocketed from Rs 126.3 million in the Fiscal Year 2002-03 to 751.2 million in 2004-2005.

''During the period of the royal government, defence expenditure reached Rs 16.45 billion from Rs 12.8 billion,'' the minister said while presenting the White Paper on the state of economy-2006 yesterday.

Allegations that Rs 280 million was spent for the local elections boycotted by major political parties, the Home Ministry had received an additional Rs 10 million to check and suppress the people's movement, he said. Another Rs 500,000 were spent daily between December 27, 2005 to April 18, 2006 due to the direct order of the then Home Minister Kamal Thapa, Dr Mahat added The white paper also provided a grim picture of the tourism, industrial and commerce sector. The continued poor performance of public corporations including the Nepal Oil Corporation and Nepal Electricity Authority and poor investment and export as well as increase in imports which resulted in trade deficit was pointed out by the minister.

Dr Mahat said apart from the budget allocated for the current Fiscal Year, an additional Rs 3.18 billion had already been released on April 28, this year.

The minister said the GDP growth rate for the current Fiscal Year had been estimated to be around 1.8 per cent. The rate about 10 years ago was 5.1 per cent on an average, he added.

Dr Mahant also appealed to the donor countries and multinational corporations to immediately resume stalled aid, provide budgetary support to resolve the immediate cash crisis and support economic reconstruction plan in the Himalayan Kingdom.

He also urged all friendly nations to cancel the travel advisories issued against Nepal and help boost the tourism industry by regarding it as a safe tourist destination.

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