In 2015, Nepal adopted a new federal setup aimed at ensuring better service delivery and good governance. To achieve the set goals, the country was federated into a three-tier federal model – federal, provincial, and local. It was widely expected that the federal structure would come into operation effectively. However, several hurdles – bureaucratic, financial, and legal challenges – have emerged while implementing federalism.

Friction among the federal, provincial, and local governments has often complicated service delivery to development projects. More importantly, the delay in promulgating federal law has paralyzed provincial and local governments. Digitization, good governance, and gender and social inclusion related programs under the flagship Provincial and Local Governance Support Programme have helped to ease service delivery. These programs haven’t fully stopped the flow of internal and overseas migration. In search of job opportunities, people from villages are migrating to cities and then to the Gulf nations and other security-sensitive countries.

In this exclusive interview, Mr. Surendra Raj Pandey, Chief Minister of Gandaki Province, shares his insights on a wide range of issues on how to strengthen federalism and make the system more efficient in the coming days. He talks about challenges lying ahead for all three sets of governments and ways to tackle them for the betterment of all governments and the people. Excerpts below:

It’s been more than seven years since a new federal setup was practically adopted. How is Gandaki province implementing federalism?

The Constitution of Nepal has declared Nepal as a federal democratic republic country. For us, federalism was a new practice. It has a provision of three tiers of government. Rights and responsibilities of all governments are defined in the constitution. Of them, some are exclusive rights whereas others are shared rights. The concerned governments are responsible to enact laws related to exclusives rights. While writing this in the constitution we also mentioned that the law promulgated by the local governments will be invalid if it contradicts with the provincial and federal laws. The provincial law also gets invalid if it contradicts with the federal laws. Because of this provision we are facing difficulties even to promulgate laws related to exclusive rights. On shared rights, it’s our compulsion to rely on the federal government. The constitution has entrusted the federal government to make laws on shared rights and affairs.

Given the federal government’s failure to promulgate law in time complexities have emerged in implementing federalism. The provincial government itself has promulgated a few laws. Some of them are being implemented. However, the fate of those acts is also uncertain as decisions made by us will be invalid automatically if provincial laws contradict those laws issued by the federal government. The federal government is yet to formulate even urgently required laws. That’s why we have been repeatedly stating that lawmaking should be the first priority of the federal government if federalism is to be implemented. Once the federal government promulgates required laws, provincial and local governments can promulgate laws as per their convenience and execute them. It's been difficult to implement federalism due to the delay in the lawmaking process.

What are the major challenges the provinces have faced in the absence of federal laws?

The first challenge is in maintaining law and order. Ensuring security in the province falls under the jurisdiction of the provincial government. For this, we need our own police. So far, neither we have been able to recruit police, nor the federal government has provisioned anything for us. The Prime Minister often says the government can’t function without power. That sort of political and administrative power should be given to provincial police. To exercise those powers our own police force should be standby with us. So far, we have been working with the police based on our personnel connection and relations. Luckily, there have been no big crimes in our province. But what happens if something goes wrong. Legally, police in Gandaki province are not obliged to follow my order. They are responsible to the federal government, not the internal affairs ministry or the chief minister of Gandaki Province. Given this situation, who will be responsible if any major incident happens in Gandaki? The chief minister or provincial police chief, chief district officer or who? There’s no clear legal clarity.

What I want to tell you is that the constitution has entrusted the responsibility of maintaining law and order to the provincial government. But the machinery required for doing the same is not available for us. That’s affecting our work performance.

Second, the provincial government has promulgated Provincial Civil Service Act, but complications are in implementing it. Civil servants deployed from the federal government are not fully loyal towards us. We are not in a position to force them to work the way we want or take action against them. They work under the provinces as per their wish. They return to the federal government whenever they want. They are more responsible towards the federal government than the provincial government. Our demand is that civil servants deployed from the federal government should be responsible to us. Some bases for holding them responsible should be given to the provincial government. We are requesting the federal government to promulgate their civil service law.

Third, what I have experienced over the years is that we cannot build hospitals, roads, drinking water projects and establish industries and hotels as requested by private sectors until and unless we get land acquisition rights. Several organizations and people from the private sectors approached me to build hospitals and industries. Land acquisition is a precondition for such development activities. We don’t have authority to give land to anyone for these development activities.

Fourth, uncertainties are in the education sector due to delay in issuing federal education law. Constitutionally, local governments are responsible for managing secondary schools, the provincial government for higher secondary level education and the federal government for universities. Roles and responsibilities of these governments should be defined in law. Likewise, the provincial government should seek consent from the federal government if anything related to investment is to be decided. People come to us requesting investment in the education sector. We cannot do the same without getting consent from the federal government. That’s our compulsion.

Police are operating without offices. They are not even equipped with motorcycles. So, they can’t patrol. Despite the lack of resources, we tried to build some houses and motorcycles. But that was not possible until we obtained consent from the line ministry of the federal government. Given this situation, we can’t deliver the expected results to the public.

Forest related acts are too complex. We tried to relax some provisions of forest clearance. But that hasn’t been implemented as it contradicts the federal forest law. The aforementioned laws should be promulgated by the federal government as soon as possible. Then only we can implement the long-cherished federalism in full swing.

You mentioned provincial governments look like ‘toothless tigers”. What should be done other than lawmaking to make federalism more functional?

Apart from lawmaking, fiscal allocation is not justifiable. As per the existing provision of National Natural Resources and Fiscal Commission 15 percent of the total royalty goes to the province, 15 percent to local government and 70 percent of it goes to the federal government. Most development works should be done by the provincial and local government. The federal government should be involved only in national pride projects. All three governments are involved in small projects so there’s duplication in development projects. There is no effective monitoring. Both local, provincial and federal governments have allocated budgets for the same road project.

Pocketing 70 percent of royalty and instructing others to work effectively is not a fair concept. Likewise, the federal government allocates funds to the province and local government as part of conditional grants. The authority of spending the money should be given to the provinces and local governments. The federal government itself shouldn’t dictate in choosing the projects and funding. Because the provincial and local governments know the necessity and priorities of such projects, not the federal government. Authority of mobilizing the equalization fund should also be given to us. The provincial government is not free to work. It’s guided by the federal government in many ways.

Because of this, projects are prioritized well, duplication is rife, and projects are delayed. It takes five to six months to complete the process set by the federal government and begin development works. Provincial governments are financially, legally and administratively guided by the federal government.

Going back to the previous question, what should be done to make provincial governments more functionable?

Legal hurdles should be settled immediately. Adequate budgets should be released for provinces. Obviously, the federal government should arrange salaries for army, police and civil servants. Apart from that it should prioritize the development of federal and local governments. Federal government should facilitate land acquisition. The federal government should coordinate between provincial and local governments in selecting prioritized projects. Due to lack of coordination and federal mindset projects prioritized by the provincial governments are ignored. There should be close coordination and cooperation among all three governments to make federalism fully functional.