KATHMANDU: Consensus has become a chimera for Nepal’s political parties, and of late ‘a package deal’ has kept ruling coalition and opposition parties apart. Reasons are but obvious: The ruling and opposition parties have their own interpretations of a package deal and its contents.
The ruling Unified CPN-Maoist and the United Democratic Madhesi Front are seeking opposition’s commitment to all the agreed agendas of the dissolved Constituent Assembly such as republicanism, secularism, inclusion, judiciary, forms of governance and election representation system. “Besides, an agreement on CA poll date, removing legal and constitutional hurdles for the polls, filling vacancies in constitutional bodies, including in the judiciary, determination of the percentage of first-past-the-post election, proportional representation system, reduction of CA seats and formation of a national consensus government are also the issues that need to be included in the package deal,” said UCPN-M Spokesman Agni Sapkota.
But UML leader Pradip Gyawali said his party has never hesitated to take the ownership of the agreed agendas of the dissolved CA. “Some leaders of the Nepali Congress say they cannot take ownership of the agreed agendas because doing that, they say, will curtail the rights of the sovereign CA. We do not agree with them,” said Gyawali.
NC has a different take though. NC leader Ram Sharan Mahat said his party was ready to agree on major issues like republicanism, secularism and federalism. “But how can we agree on all issues now? It will be an infringement of CA’s mandate. If we have to agree on all issues, then why should there be an election for the CA?” questioned Mahat.
The UCPN-M and UDMF say they want opposition’s commitment to issues of constitution because they do not want to see the new CA fail again. “We have heard opposition leaders saying federalism is not their agenda. If the CA fails again, it will fit to their scheme, and they can then push for the formation of a commission,” said Sadbhawana Party Co-Chairman Laxman Lal Karna.
Prior to CA elections, the UCPN-M, which feared that NC and UML might drag their feet to declare the country a republic, had forced them to incorporate the provision of abolishing the monarchy from the first meeting of CA in the constitution. “Opposition parties have failed to embrace the changes. Empowerment of marginalised communities is not their agenda. Therefore, we fear that if they do not commit to the agreed agendas now, they can reverse the wheel of change later,” said Sapkota.
UDMF has its own concerns on federalism, the only major issue that proved to be most contentious in the dissolved CA.
“We want the next CA to choose one model out of three — the 14-, 10- and six-pradesh models that were the property of the dissolved CA,” said Jitendra Dev, Spokesperson, Madhesi Janaadhikar Forum-Nepal. The package deal, he added, should also include the provision of either granting citizenship to those whose names figured in 2008 voter list or enabling them to vote in the next election without voter identity card. “We can even boycott the next election if the voter list issue is not resolved,” he said.
He added that although parties had agreed to have 240 FPTP seats, Madhesi parties can lobby for five more FPTP seats as per the percentage of Madhes population mentioned in the new census data.
Sabaikhabar.com
0 comments:
Post a Comment