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The draft of the Common Minimum Program of the government has been prepared. A meeting of the task force held on Friday has decided to table the draft in the meeting of the senior leaders to be held on Saturday, Rastriya Swatantra Party spokesperson Mukul Dhakal said. Emerging from the meeting of the task force held in Singhadurbar today, he said, “The task force has prepared the draft. Basically, issues of development are included in the Common Minimum Program. Likewise, the draft has given priority to good governance.” The Common Minimum Program includes programs such as corruption control, health education, service delivery and sanitation among others. Good governance, protection of nationality, improvement of the economy, prosperity and completion of the peace process are included in the priority program of the government. The task force was formed under the headship of Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Bishnu Poudel. Barshaman Pun of the CPN (Maoist Center), Mukul Dhakal of the Rastriya Swatantra Party, Dhawal Shumsher Rana of the Rastriya Prajatantra Party and Rakan Chemjong are the members of the task force.    

Finance Minister Bishnu Poudel and US Ambassador to Nepal Dean R Thompson held a meeting on Friday. During the meeting held at Singhadurbar, the duo discussed contemporary political issues. It has been learnt that Minister Poudel and Ambassador Thompson also talked about the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) project. Saying that Nepal and the US have a strong relationship, Ambassador Thompson expressed his belief that the relation will be strengthened further in the coming days.

The Ministry of Labor, Employment and Social Security is to issue the institutional and individual labour permit from the seven provinces from January 8. Before this, the Ministry had been providing the labour permits only from Kathmandu. In this connection, the labor permits would be issued from the Employment Office at Biratnagar and Janakpur also from coming Sunday, the Ministry stated. The Employment Office at Biratnagar and Janakpur had been only renewing the labour permit. Secretary at the Ministry Ek Narayan Aryal said that from January 8, the Employment Office at Janakpur and Biratnagar will also be issuing the institutional and individual labour permits. According to him, the Foreign Employment Office at Pokhara and Butwal have been providing all three types of services, including issuing institutional and individual labour permits and their renewal. Renewal of labour permit and issuance of individual labour permit has been started from the Labor and Employment Office at Surkhet and Kailali also. Arrangements have been made for providing all types of labour permits from the Labour and Employment Office based at Biratnagar and Janakpur from next Sunday, Joint Secretary and Ministry Spokesperson Dundu Raj Ghimire said. With this, provision has been made for issuing all types of labor permits from the Labor and Employment Office in all the seven provinces. The Ministry stated through a press release that arrangements have been made for accessing all types of labour permits online without the service-seeker having to be present in person at the Labour Office and the problem of having to face various hassles has been removed.  

The government made public the decisions of the Cabinet meeting held on Thursday. Government spokesperson and Finance Minister Bishnu Poudel made public the decisions on Friday. He said that the Cabinet meeting has given approval to carry out the Organization and Management Survey to establish a customs office at Pokhara International Airport on the proposal of the Ministry of Finance. Similarly, the government has decided to hold the National Assembly by-election on February 8. The government has also decided to provide Rs 1 million each to the family of Sanjeeb AD and Chetan AD who died during the elections to the House of Representatives and Province Assembly. Likewise, the meeting has decided to provide financial support to bring the body of Nirakar Pandey, who died in a fire in Cambodia, to Nepal. On top of that, the government has decided to appoint Toyama Raya as Finance Secretary and Ram Prasad Ghimire as Revenue Secretary.