The main opposition Nepali Congress (NC) has slammed the government for ending the House session without holding discussion on the cooperatives scam.
Speaking after the parliamentary party meeting on Sunday Chief Whip Ramesh Lekhak has claimed that the sudden ending of House session has proved that Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) President and Home Minister Rabi Lamichhane is involved in the scam.
Pointing that the government need not be worried to form a parliamentary probe committee and run away from the House if the minister were not involved in the cooperatives scam, the NC parliamentary party meeting’s decision has expressed commitment toward more strongly standing for a fair and impartial investigation on the scam that has misappropriated savings of hundreds of thousands amounting to billions.
President Ram Chandra Paudel on Sunday ended the ongoing session of Parliament. The Cabinet meeting held at the Singha Durbar on Friday decided to recommend to the president to end the ongoing Parliament session from Sunday midnight.
President Paudel accordingly ended the ongoing session of both the House of Representatives (HoR) and National Assembly effective from Sunday midnight.
The ruling coalition and the opposition held different rounds of meetings on initiation of Speaker Dev Raj Ghimire to ensure smooth operation of the House but to no avail.
The meetings failed to yield any resolution with the main opposition NC adamant on its demand for parliamentary probe committee and the ruling coalition refusing to oblige.
The ruling coalition then decided to end the House session to stop NC from obstructing the House proceedings.
NC had been raising the issue of cooperatives scam in the House and demanding a parliamentary committee to investigate involvement of Deputy Prime Minister (DPM) and Home Minister Lamichhane in the scam.
Some victims had filed a complaint against Lamichhane at the District Police Office, Kaski on February 5 alleging him of misappropriation of money of Surya Darshan Savings and Credit Cooperative Limited of Pokhara, Kaski.
Gorkha Media, which had Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) President and Home Minister Rabi Lamichhane as shareholder and managing director (MD), has been found to have taken loan of Rs 105 million from Supreme Cooperative, Rs 120 million from Sahara Cooperative of Chitwan and Rs 100 million from Suryadarshan Cooperative of Pokhara.
Clause 50 of the Cooperatives Act 2017 stipulates that a cooperative can accept deposit only from its members, and lend to only its members. Similarly, the Company Directive 2015 also prohibits a private company from acquiring shares of a cooperative and stipulates that even the shares acquired before the directive came into force be transferred to others within a year. It also prohibits a company from borrowing from a cooperative.
Promoter of Gorkha Media GB (Gitendra) Rai was also chairman of Supreme Cooperative. He made Om Prakash Gurung chairman only two years back and remained patron. GB Rai had also opened Suryodaya Cooperative.
The cooperatives have yet to return billions saved by thousands of depositors.
NC has been demanding a parliamentary committee to investigate the scam including involvement of Lamichhane pointing that the government cannot conduct fair and impartial investigation in the case involving Home Minister Lamichhane. But speaking in the House PM Dahal has already given Lamichhane a clean chit.
