Remember Watergate Scandal which led to the resignation of President Richard Nixon from the most powerful office in the world, that is, the presidency of the United States, and led to the instalment of the first non-elected President in the United States. Watergate, in fact, is just the name of an apartment complex that also housed the headquarters of the Democratic

Party that witnessed a burglary on June 23, 1972 which President Nixon was accused

of covering up.

If the same sense, or even a fraction, of integrity and moral responsibility has to be maintained in our country by the politicians, either the Minister of Finance or the Speaker of the House or both have to resign from their posts in the current scandal involving the allocation of one million rupees to the members of the House for the development of their constituencies.

It might be recalled that recently the Ministry of Finance has provided Rs 1.0 million to all members of the House. It was opposed by the public and the media on the grounds that it is the direct misuse of resources by the seven political parties. Subsequently, there was a

rat race among the politicians to appear innocent among the public on the eve of election to the Constituent Assembly. As a result, as in Watergate scandal, the public, myself included, do not know the truth that they are interested to know.

The Minister of Finance on one occasion informed the concerned that it was included in the current year budget document. He did not, however, realise that the budget document was prepared with the hope that the election to the Constituent Assembly (CA) will be held in November 2007. Instead he explained that he was compelled to provide the money as he was informed, through the Speaker of the House, that the members of the House would not let it conduct its regular business otherwise. The opposition from the public, however, was so vehement that Seven Party Alliance decided to request the Government “to freeze” the fund, and the Election Commission too requested the Government to stop it. At last, on February 5, even the Supreme Court ruled that the “proposal of doling out Rs.1 million to each member of the parliament was illegal.” The case was closed, though for some of the reactionary souls like me, it is just the beginning.

Going through the version of the Minister of Finance, he was blackmailed by the legislature with none other than the Speaker acting as the middleman to keep the business of Interim Legislature-Parliament. My simple question is: Is this the first time or is it an ongoing process where the members of the legislature are blackmailing the responsible officers of the Executive Branch of the Government — in our case the Minister of Finance — for one purpose or another. In the same breath, it is legitimate to wonder whether the Minister was compelled to frame several of the proposals in the current year budget too through the same procedure. If yes, what are they? The public needs to be informed in detail about all these.

The Speaker, too, as claimed by the Minister of Finance, may have informed him about the demand made by the members for the allocation of Rs.1 million. We have not heard anything from the Speaker yet as this is not his area of business.

The question is: why did the Speaker act as a middleman in such an illegal affair? The members would have demanded the fund directly from the Minister of Finance. In any case, the blame is now being shifted to the Speaker. Comments journalist Yubaraj Ghimire in his regular column in a vernacular weekly, “Is it not appropriate for the Speaker to take the symbolic responsibility for the decision of the Election Commission to check the use of financial resources from the Treasury without any procedure but in an institutional manner”.

We can now simply request the Speaker to tell the real story and, if true as indicated by the Minister of Finance, can now make public the names of the members of the House who had made such a demand. There is another version of the story too which is being discussed among the economists who are least bothered by the amount involved but by the procedure that has been followed by the authorities.

It is argued by them that the decision to allocate the fund of Rs.1 million was made by the Minister of Finance alone not expecting public outcry in such a degree. Now, he is trying to save himself by inventing one or another story — a game that he is fully mature to play — that is why Seven Party Alliance has, as discussed above, easily asked the Government to freeze the release. All of these rumours, accusations have surfaced primarily because the public does not know the truth but are very eager to have the detailed information. Otherwise, it may appear as powerful as the Watergate Scandal.

Dr Pant is executive director, Institute of Development Studies