Prakash A. Raj, Nepal

Nepal's development budget has been heavily dependent upon bilateral and multilateral assistance for several years. There are also many INGO's working in Nepal which receive a considerable funding from foreign governments and also from non-government sources. It is believed that a large percentage of funds received never benefit the target groups or are spent for the purpose they were originally intended due to lack of integrity, transparency and accountability.

Accountability

The primary accountability for funds received in bilateral assistance is to the government or ultimately to the legislative bodies appropriating the funds for a specific purpose. On the other hand, such accountability in case of multilateral assistance is to the governing board consisting of countries providing such assistance. In case of INGOs the accountability will be to the Board of the INGO providing funds. As such funds are channeled for the most part through the Government of the recipient country, it is the major stakeholder but is often not considered accountable. There are also cases when funds in development co-operation are sent by non-government channels and sometimes in such a way that the government is not aware of such transfer. Some have already talked about shift in emphasis of donors no longer regarding the host state as sole representative of the people but also doing business with local bodies and civil society as well. There is ample scope of corruption in all of these transfers that may be called "development co-operation". Dr. Harka Gurung found that development aid has widened the scope for corruption in Nepal . As development co-operation is for such purpose as poverty reduction and overall development, the people of the country are also major stakeholders and the funds received should also be accountable to them. In other words, taxpayers of donor countries and elected representatives of beneficiaries could be considered the two major stakeholders if development co-operation were to be considered a "partnership".

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Posted by pichu at August 16, 2006 11:43 PM