The meeting of inter-province council that includes prime minister and the seven chief ministers (CM) has been called for December 9.
"We have decided to convene the meeting in the second week of December after completing different preparations. We are doing preparations for that," Bishnu Rimal, the chief political advisor to PM KP Sharma Oli, told Setopati.
The inter-government finance council will meet before the meeting with CMs. The finance council, which has federal finance minister as the coordinator, also has 14 representatives including finance minister and either of the chief or deputy chief of any local body from each province. Seven of those 14 members must be women. It also includes three experts including a woman.
The council will review the challenges faced by the provinces and works needed to be done to address the challenges. "Three teams headed by a secretary have been formed by the federal Cabinet and the teams are in the provinces taking stock of the problems the provinces are facing," Rimal revealed. "CMs have also given suggestions apart from that. PM will complete preparations about what can be done after receiving all these feedbacks, and convene the inter-province council meeting."
Rimal also revealed that commissioners in the Finance Commission will also be appointed before the inter-province council meeting. The commission currently only has a secretary and other staffers. The commission will make arrangements for resource allocation among the federal, provincial and local governments.
PM Oli is facing criticisms for not convening the meeting of inter-province council envisioned by the constitution for resolving political disputes among the three levels of government. The CMs have been calling for meeting of the council for a long time.
PM Oli had earlier called the meeting for September 10 but he cancelled the meeting in the eleventh hour. The seven CMs had met in Pokhara to discuss what they should tell the PM in the meeting and issued an eight-point declaration ahead of the scheduled meeting. PM Oli then called off the meeting in anger taking that as a public rebuke of him. He has not called the meeting since.
The council is chaired by PM and has CMs of the seven provinces and federal home and finance ministers as members. The PM can convene its meeting on the basis of necessity as per the constitution.
The inter-government finance council had last met in April. The council will meet the next week.
