Prime Minister Balen Shah’s secretariat has intensified pressure on the Department of Passports to immediately cancel the contract awarded to German companies for printing passports.
On Saturday evening, Madhav Khanal, a member of the prime minister’s secretariat, called Deepak BK, the joint secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs who is currently heading the Department of Passports, and pressured him to scrap the contract with the German companies by Monday afternoon.
After the prime minister’s secretariat bypassed the parent ministry and directly issued a sensitive verbal directive to them to cancel the contract, department employees visited the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Sunday seeking help.
“Understanding the gravity of the matter, the minister (for foreign affairs) called us today, and we briefed the ministry leadership on everything,” said one official.
Joint Secretary BK, along with some senior officers from the passport department, visited the ministry on Sunday. They held discussions with Foreign Minister Shishir Khanal, Foreign Secretary Amrit Rai, Administration Department Chief Surendra Yadav, and others at the ministry.
According to two participants in the meeting who spoke to Setopati, the passport department team provided detailed information to the Foreign Ministry leadership about the pressure they had received.
Department officials briefed the minister and his team that Madhav Khanal from the prime minister’s secretariat had told them, “Cancel the contract by any means. The department can make that decision itself; there is no need to even ask the minister.”
They also informed the ministry that Khanal had instructed them to immediately call a “certain” person from the French company Idemia (which previously printed passports) after canceling the contract and to initiate the process of procuring additional passports from that company.
The officials further briefed the ministry that Khanal had told them to follow the directive from the Prime Minister’s Office, warning that “ministers and secretaries are not permanent.”
After listening to the department employees, Minister Khanal directed them to continue working to ensure passports are printed by the German companies on the scheduled date.
“The minister has said that he will talk to the prime minister’s team on Monday and instructed us to continue preparations for printing passports according to the original plan,” said one official present in the meeting.
PM Shah’s team has been making repeated attempts to force the department to cancel the contract awarded to the two German companies for printing new passports. Under the contract, the two German companies are required to print and supply 6.4 million passports to the Nepal government over the next five years.
After winning the contract, the German companies have reached the final stage of preparations for printing new e-passports. They have already informed the department in writing that they have completed all preparations for printing new passports starting July 15. They have also written a letter requesting security arrangements for their staff.
On June 15, members of the prime minister’s secretariat had summoned officials of the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) to Singha Durbar and “detained” them for about 8-9 hours, forcing them to file a case regarding the passport contract.
CIAA officials, while present there, were coerced into issuing arrest warrants for Director General of the Department of Passports, Tirtha Raj Aryal, and IT Director Sunil KC.
Following this, the CIAA conducted a rapid investigation and filed a case against 18 people in connection with the passport contract last week.
PM Shah’s chief advisor Kumar Ben and advisor Asim Shah have been leading the efforts to have the contract with the German companies canceled. It was Kumar Ben who reportedly “threatened” CIAA officials at the Prime Minister’s Office on June 15, saying, “No one can leave here today without issuing arrest warrants.”
Even since the case was filed, members of PM Shah’s secretariat have been mounting pressure to cancel the contract awarded to the German companies and to purchase additional passports from the previous French company.
However, Foreign Minister Khanal has not yielded to this pressure.
A department employee said, “Minister Khanal is clear that the old contract should not be canceled unilaterally. He has argued that if the contract is canceled in this manner, the German companies could take the matter to international arbitration, which would cause huge financial loss to the country and damage its reputation. That is why he has been directing us to continue the work of printing passports with the German companies even though the CIAA has proceeded with the case.”
However, the prime minister’s secretariat team has repeatedly tried to cancel the contract by claiming that the German companies are not capable of printing passports, one department employee said.
“They visited the department many times before and expressed doubts, saying the preparations for printing passports were not complete and that the German companies are not capable of printing passports,” the employee said.
After they repeatedly expressed such doubts, German engineers took three members of the prime minister’s secretariat – advisors Asim Shah, IT advisor Bibek Mishra, and Madhav Khanal – to the department on June 16 and printed a sample passport in their presence.
That day, they took Asim Shah’s biometrics, completed all procedures, and demonstrated the printing of his sample passport.
Even after this demonstration, they have not stopped doubting the German companies and attempting to force the cancellation of the contract.
Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Khanal has been closely monitoring the progress of the new passport printing project since he assumed office.
“Since the minister has been closely observing everything, we have never found him to have any doubts that passports will be printed through the new system,” said a department official. “Even after returning from the party’s general convention, he has instructed us to work to ensure passports are printed on or before July 15. We are working accordingly.”
The official said that the department will continue its work until the prime minister or the minister himself issues a directive to stop it.
