Tokha Municipality in Kathmandu last year signed a “gentlemen's agreement” with Nagqu, also Naqu city of Tibet Autonomous Region, China, to establish sister city relations.

The municipality is now seeking approval of the federal government on the draft of the Memorandum of Understanding prepared by the two cities to formalise the relations.
“After receiving approval from the provincial government, the draft has reached the Cabinet of the federal government,” Prakash Adhikari, mayor of Tokha Municipality, told the Post. “We have proposed extending cooperation in the areas of sports, culture park development and scholarship, among others, with the city of Nagqu. We hope the Cabinet will soon approve the MOU.”

Nagqu will be the first city with which Tokha Municipality is planning to establish sister city relations.

However, the federal government has raised concern over the procedure adopted by some local governments including that of Tokha Municipality while establishing sister city relations.

Resham Kadel, under secretary at the Development Assistance Coordination Division of the Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration, said local governments are not allowed to sign even gentlemen’s agreements without approval from the federal government.

“Be it a gentlemen’s agreement or an MOU, they cannot be signed without prior approval of the federal government. This is something set by the country’s law,” Kadel told the Post.

As per section 11 (8) of the Local Level Operation Act 2017, local governments can establish sister city relations based on the recommendation of the provincial government and after taking prior approval from the federal government.

The Federal Affairs Ministry on Tuesday said in a notice that some local governments have been found to have signed sister city agreements without taking approval from the federal government.

“Some have been found to have signed the MOU that is different from what was approved by the Nepal government,” the notice of the ministry reads.

The ministry has asked the local governments to mandatorily take approval of the federal government and sign agreement in the format as approved by the Cabinet while establishing sister city relations with foreign cities.

According to Kadel, at least three local governments have either signed an agreement without taking approval of the federal government or signed agreements in formats different from what was approved by the Cabinet.

“We have received requests from some local governments to approve the MOU that they had signed with foreign local governments to establish sister city relations. We cannot take such a proposal to the Cabinet,” he said.

Officials at the Federal Affairs Ministry said that there is a risk of the country's foreign policy being compromised if the local governments sign sister city agreements with foreign local governments without prior approval from the central government.

“The local government should be mindful of the fact that international relations fall under sole jurisdiction of the federal government and local governments should operate within their boundary while establishing relations with local governments of foreign countries,” said Bishnu Dutta Gautam, chief of planning and development assistance corporation division at the federal affairs ministry.

Meanwhile, the Federal Affairs Ministry is preparing a working procedure regarding how local governments should establish sister city relations.

“It will cover the areas such as process to be adopted, protocol matching between the local governments of two countries and areas of cooperation such as tourism, culture and economic cooperation,” said Kadel. “It will be introduced in the next one or one and half months.”

According to Gautam, the working procedure will also determine the kind of support a local government could accept from foreign sister cities and the number of foreign local governments with which a Nepali local governments could sign such agreements.

According to the ministry, as many as 16 local governments have so far got approval from the federal government to establish sister city relations with foreign cities. There are 753 local units in the country.

But due to the lack of proper guidelines and monitoring oversights, one local government has established sister city relations with several foreign cities. For example, Kathmandu Metropolitan City has established such relations with 16 foreign cities.

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