Kathmandu. Minister for Land Management, Cooperatives and Poverty Alleviation, Pratibha Rawal, has said that the Ministry of Cooperatives was the first priority of the government as it was a matter of prestige.

During a meeting with the media persons associated with the Society of Cooperative Journalists (CJN) at the Ministry today, Minister Bhandari said that the incumbent government was working with determination to resolve the problems of the cooperatives.

Minister Rawal, who is also a former journalist, said that it was necessary for journalists to carry out research on cooperatives and highlight about the present situation and possible problems that might arise in the future.

Stressing the need for collaboration between the Ministry of Cooperatives and the CJN, she said, “It will be easier for us to understand the issues from you as the media persons have a lot of information about cooperatives.” Therefore, I will hold internal discussions on how to collaborate with the CJN on which modality. ’

She also complained that some media outlets have politicized the cooperative sector and made unnecessary publicity linking Rastriya Swatantra Party (RPP) Chairman Rabi Lamichhane. She accused the mainstream media of giving priority only to controversial issues rather than highlighting the problems of cooperatives.

She said, “Until yesterday, publishing news linking Ravi Lamichhane’s name used to hurt people who burn maize and save it in cooperatives.” The problem persists to this day. However, there is no news about them. There was politics in it. Journalists should not write news selectively. ’

She stressed that the media should bring the real things about cooperatives to the people.

Talking about the problems faced by cooperatives, Minister Rawal said that there are many irregularities in cooperatives. So far, 23 organizations have been declared problematic and 16 have been recommended for declaring problematic.

“Some people have been saying that the NRB should regulate to maintain good governance in cooperatives,” she said, adding, “But the principle of bank and cooperatives is different.” If cooperatives are to be made like banks, why do we need cooperatives?”

According to her, the biggest challenge is to know how to prevent the existing cooperatives from becoming problematic rather than managing the problematic cooperatives.

According to Minister Rawal, the commission formed by the government under the coordination of former justice Binod Prasad Sharma to investigate into the irregularities in cooperatives has submitted its report today. She also said that she would hold discussions with the media persons after studying the commission’s report.

She said that the problems of cooperatives have been increasing as the state has not implemented the reports submitted by the committees formed at different times in the past.

“The government ignored the recommendations of the parliamentary probe committee led by former lawmaker Surya Bahadur Thapa. ’

She stressed the need for support from the Ministry of Home Affairs, Ministry of Finance, Office of Attorney General and judiciary as the departmental ministries alone could not solve the problems of cooperatives.

She also said that the problematic cooperative management committee does not have accurate data on the number of savers to return the money.

She said, “There is one statement of savings made by the same saver in the logbook, another in the system and there is a separate demand in the charge sheet of the case.” Therefore, it is difficult for people who come with the real intention of solving problems to work. ’

On the occasion, Minister Rawal complained that internal conflict has surfaced between the NRA and the Department of Cooperatives as the government established the National Cooperative Regulatory Authority without studying the scope and responsibilities of the government. “There is a fear that there will be a fight between the employees of the two agencies,” she said. ’

She said that work was underway to resolve the dispute between the NRA and the department and to give more powers to the problematic cooperative management committee. Similarly, she said that efforts are being made to remove various legal hurdles in recovering loans from borrowers who have taken loans from problematic cooperatives.

She clarified that she chose the ordinance as it would take time to amend the laws through the regular parliamentary process as the incumbent government was under pressure to work immediately and give results. She also stressed the need to clear the misconceptions created among the public about the revolving fund set up by the government to return money to small savers of cooperatives that are now in trouble.

“The government has defrauded the cooperatives by giving back the money from the state treasury to the aggrieved savers. Now, even if the cooperatives are made problematic, the message can be sent that the state will pay the money. But this is wrong,” she said. But in the future, the state will be compensated by recovering from the debtors of the problematic cooperatives. ’

She said that the government had aimed to collect money from the borrowers of the troubled cooperatives and distribute it to the savers at the same time. After issuing the notice, 53 borrowers went to the committee and 12 of them had repaid the loans.

She said that the government has adopted a policy of starting from small savers while returning the savings and gradually giving it to the big savers while repaying the loans. Stating that she would start the work of repaying the savings after recovering the money from many borrowers of the cooperatives, she said, “The committee has a plan to make public the names of the borrowers who have not repaid the loan within 15 days and also stop the services they receive from the state as electricity, drinking water, internet and other facilities.” ’

Stating that the banks and financial institutions under the Nepal Rastra Bank (NRB) should be given first priority while auctioning the property of borrowers, Minister Rawal said that the cooperatives and banks and financial institutions should take the money obtained by auctioning such property.