The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of the parliament will amend the report submitted by the subcommittee formed to investigate the procurement of two wide-body planes by the Nepal Airlines Corporation (NAC).
The PAC has handed over the report to secretariat for amendment after the majority of lawmakers from ruling CPN during the meeting at Singha Durbar on Friday demanded amendment. The PAC has decided to endorse the report on Monday after amendment.
PAC Chairman Bharat Kumar Shah said the main points of the report cannot be removed and only some improvement in language can be made. "Removing the main points will castrate the report," Shah, who is from the main opposition party Nepali Congress (NC), said. "We can only make some changes in the language."
Another NC lawmaker Minendra Rijal also opined that the basic structure should not be changed while amending the report.
The subcommittee’s report made public on Wednesday concluded that Minister for Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation Rabindra Adhikari was complicit in corruption of Rs 4.3556 billion during the procurement process. The subcommittee headed by NC lawmaker Rajan KC also found moral responsibility of Adhikari’s predecessors Jitendra Narayan Dev and Jeevan Bahadur Shahi in the case.
The government has already called the report erroneous and formed a probe commission to investigate the procurement process.
The Cabinet meeting Thursday formed a high level probe commission under former justice Govinda Prasad Parajuli, and including former deputy attorney general Nanda Prasad Pathak and chartered accountant Madan Sharma giving it 45 days to submit its report, according to a minister.
The government has claimed there are two errors in the report. “The first thing is the subcommittee should have made the report public only after submitting it to the PAC. The report has been made public even before the PAC took decision,” the minister pointed. “The other thing is they have hugely politicized the issue. How can the minister who took the decision to buy the planes (sic) only have moral responsibility and the minister who paid the installment be the main accused (sic)?”
The minister revealed that the government will not take immediate action against Minister Adhikari, Tourism Secretary Krishna Prasad Devkota and Home Secretary Prem Kumar Rai, who was tourism secretary and ex officio chairman of the NAC board at the time of procurement, and NAC General Manager Sugat Ratna Kansakar.
“Let’s see what decision the PAC takes. What should be done can be decided only after the government commission submit its report,” the minister stated.
