The government stands by its interpretation that it has achieved most of the 25 pledges it pledged to fulfill in 120 days in office despite its assessment coming under increased criticism from the media and the Opposition.

The Opposition’s assessment stated that only one pledge was achieved and about four achieved partially.

Opposition Leader, Pema Gyamtsho (PhD) said that in contrast to the government’s earlier claim that its pledges were easy to fulfil as thorough consultations and researches were carried, most of them today required further review.

Prime Minister Dr Lotay Tshering said yesterday, “On Samrang farm, if you want to go word for word, that is also a point. If you said we should have visited it and made the pledge you are right. We are sorry for that.”

The government claimed that it has achieved 11 of the 25 pledges.

Lyonchhen said that his government has not lied and how the government performed in the first four months in office is left to every individual’s interpretation.

He said the government could have chased with complete focus on the 25 pledges and accomplished them. “Then you would call it short term and beat the government for lacking long term vision,” he said.

Lyonchhen said that what has been achieved is in the process of good governance and that it did not spend extra time on the pledges.

“The instruction to the ministers was to do what is needed wholeheartedly, and that once the pledges are implemented they cannot go back or there should not be any problems.”

For instance, the prime minister said that the annual education conference decided to do away with Class X cut off point from 2020. The government went ahead with the decision this year given that more than 4,000 students would have to look for jobs. The pledge to do away with examinations for class PP-VI was pushed to next year following advice from professionals in the ministry.

He said the government was criticised that they don’t heed to experts’ views on the cut off point decision. At the same time, it was blamed for pushing the decision on doing away with exams for Classes PP-III in which case it listened to the experts.

The government would end up being flogged with criticism any way – whether all its pledges were achieved or not, he said.

Lyonchhen said the government accepted its failures in not achieving some of the pledges.

The government’s spokesperson and foreign minister Dr Tandi Dorji said everyone is entitled to their interpretations.

“We respect their views. Ultimately, it’s up to the people to judge,” lyonpo said. “We have also implemented programmes which are not in the 25 pledges.”

Tshering Palden

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