The Bhutanese Leading the way.
The National Council, during its 16th session, adopted the final recommendations submitted by the three committees on Annual Anti-Corruption Commission Report 2016, Cultural Heritage and Audit Bill of Bhutan 2017.
On the Annual Anti-corruption commission Report 2017 the Council directed the Good Governance Committee to conduct a meeting with relevant members on the disputed sections and come up with final recommendations.
The Council noted that majority of complaints to ACC are linked to grievances arising from lack of transparency and maladministration. Thus the committee came up with two recommendations for adoption.
The committee recommended ACC develop a mechanism in collaboration with agencies like the RCSC, DHI, and MOLHR among others, to effectively deal with complaints that are administrative in nature, and to review and streamline the apparent inconsistencies in handling seized immovable and moveable properties.
The Social and Cultural Affairs Committee presented the recommendations from the in-house meeting conducted by the committee to the house on Monday for adoption. Some of the general recommendations for the government to scrutinize were to: finalise and endorse the Bhutan Culture policy document which should encompass all aspects of cultural heritage, both tangible and intangible; review the Cultural Heritage Bill with the necessary stakeholders and make it a comprehensive legal proposal by including popular concerns and suggestions about Bhutan’s tangible and intangible cultural heritage; strategise and scale up programs to raise funds for the Cultural Heritage Trust Fund; recognize and reward institution and individuals with incentives such as research and project grants, scholar ships as well as employment opportunities for promoting and preserving Bhutanese values and ethos; and look into the possibility of revising wages for artisans, crafts men and performing artists, etc.
Total of eight recommendations on Traditional Architecture, six on Performing Art, three on vernacular languages and six on Driglam Namzha were submitted for adoption.
The Legislative Committee submitted the final recommendations on the 41 clauses of the Audit Bill 2017, which is the only new bill the Council introduced this session. The bill was deliberated on 11th May and the house unanimously adopted all the recommendations of the committee on Monday.
The Audit Bill of Bhutan 2017 will be forwarded to the National Assembly and the recommendations adopted in regard to Annual Anti-Corruption Report 2016 and Cultural Heritage will be forwarded to the concerned entities.
