The Druk Nyamrup Tshogpa (DNT) officially started their campaign with the launch of its manifesto today in Thimphu. The manifesto spells out plans and ways to achieve the party’s goal of “narrowing the gap”.
With blessings from the holy Machhen in Punakha Dzong and Ap Genyen in Dechenphu, the party chose to begin its campaign by reaching out to the youth in Thimphu.
The other top priority of DNT is to ensure there is no disparity in terms of access to health care services and facilities in the country.
The party’s president Lotay Tshering said his party will ensure access to specialist services like endoscopy, ultrasound and blood tests at gewog levels, and upgrade hospitals in strategic places to enable access to specialist services among others.
He added DNT has solutions to problems the country is currently facing.
“What are the needs of the country and what are the problems that are plaguing this country, and these are what we will try to solve,” DNT president Lotay Tshering said.
“Every five years, I think people must think out of the box and try to come up with solutions to the problems that we have. So, I think our manifesto is inclusive. We have targeted therapies for the problems. They are both short-term and long-term, and in the interest of the nation in the long run.”
Developing Vision 2045, a development plan document for Bhutan, and health and tourism policies are also in the priority list.
In terms of addressing unemployment in the country, some of the initiatives of the party include establishing employment and livelihood corporation and supporting private sector to create 5,000 jobs annually.
It also intends to reintroduce one-year national service program for graduates to gain experience, and understand national issues and plan careers as part of efforts to reduce unemployment.
Increasing salary twice for the civil servants during their tenure, doing away with the existing five per cent voucher tax, building flats for home ownership and increasing taxable Personal Income Tax (PIT) slab to Nu 300,000 are other initiatives the party will focus on if it gets elected.
