Registration of corruption cases against elected representatives and officials at local units across the country has become common. The situation is so bad that several local units have even been unable to do their regular work as officials who make key decisions have been suspended after facing corruption charges. For instance, works at Godawari Municipality of Lalitpur, Bagmati Municipality of Sarlahi and Jaleswar Municipality of Mahottari have been hampered as both mayors and deputy mayors of the municipalities have been suspended after they were chargesheeted in corruption cases. The local units have been paralyzed as they haven’t been able to settle who will make decisions as the acting chief; existing laws didn’t envision both top officials being sued at the same time. The Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration is now consulting the Office of the Attorney General on removing legal complications in this regard.

Not only elected representatives, key bureaucrats are as engaged in irregularities. Corruption cases have been filed against chief administrative officers of scores of municipalities in the past one year. Some of them have been convicted while cases against many others are sub-judice. Annual reports of the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) paint an alarming picture of irregularities in local administrations. For instance, according to the annual report-2022/23 of the CIAA, of the total 28,067 cases filed by the anti-graft body in the one-year period, 13,142 cases were against officials of local units. Likewise, 11,632 cases were against the officials at the federal agencies and 3,293 against provincial officials. Hence, over 46.8 percent of total corruption cases the CIAA registered in the period are against the irregularities committed by local representatives and officials.

The new constitution greatly empowered the local units through the devolution of many erstwhile centralised powers. The constitution is considered to be favouring local authorities even more than the provinces when it comes to rights and responsibilities. After the full-fledged implementation of the three-tier federal system since 2017, all the 753 local units have been exercising executive, legislative and judicial rights in running local administration and formulating rules for themselves. The constitution empowered them significantly but not much was done to enhance their capacity for delivery.

Nearly eight years of federal experience shows the local units have failed to maintain good governance and fiscal transparency. Local representatives blame lack of efficient employees and dearth of resources for their substandard performance. Traditionally, civil servants in Nepal have always preferred to stay in urban centres. Also, the federal government has failed to provide sufficient manpower, efficient technical hands and enough resources to improve efficiency in administration outside the Valley. The nature and magnitude of corruption cases and irregularities seen in recent years suggest urgent steps are needed to make the local governments more accountable, transparent and efficient. What we see right now is the representatives and the provincial and local levels repeating many of the corrupt practices of the federal-level representatives. It is hard to make the local representatives responsible when they see that their party bosses at the centre are even more unaccountable and unreliable.