After an unusual month of
May in which Nepal’s ministers were uncharacteristically busy and active, an
air of normalcy seems to have returned over the country. This normalcy is
chracterised by policy paralysis and political infighting. Hardly is a minister
even talking about the constitution, and nor has there been any attempt to
rectify the differences between the four key parties – the Maoists, the Nepali
Congress, the UML and the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum – on the tricky issues of
ethnicity-based federalism and the form of government to be adopted.
The Constituent Assembly had a truly historic opportunity to set the country on the path to stability and progress, and they blew it. With perfunctory admissions of failure, they seem to have already moved on, while the nation is still reeling from the (non-) constitutional crisis.
On the one hand, Baburam Bhattarai speaks of a consensus government comprising of all key parties. On the other, he couldn't maintain unity even within his own party with Mohan Baidhya’s split. The Koiralas and Sher Bahadur Deuba are at loggerheads in the Nepali Congress and perfectly happy to tear the party apart, while it is difficult to keep track of how many Madhesi parties there now are. With such levels of infighting within parties, it is rather naive to expect that Nepal can have a national unity government, or one for too long anyway.
Bhattarai has said Nepal will go to the polls in November. Now Nepal’s Acting Chief Election Commissioner Neelkantha Upreti has said on record that if elections cannot be conducted in November, then they could potentially be postponed till 13 April, 2013. In a country where nothing happens on time if it involves political leadership, this is an open invitation to the political parties to care even less than they already do. This statement by Upreti could not have come at a worse time. The earlier the country heads to the polls, the less will be the damage the democratic set up, which has been made into some kind of a joke by the four big political parties.
This is the time for Nepal to get its act together. The political parties need to look within before pointing fingers at one another for their failure to write the constitution on time. There are no clear lines being taken by the political parties. While no stone is being left unturned to tear apart the points of views of other parties, no concrete attempts are being made to provide solutions either. Each party is stuck upon its own idea of federalism (whether Nepal should have single ethnicity-based, or multiple ethnicity-based states). The discussions around the federal structure are based on rigid party positions as opposed to the requirements of the country and its people.
At no point in any of these discussions are the prospects of the citizens of the country important. That these politicians are the “representatives” of the Nepalese people escapes them completely.
Post dissolution of the Constituent Assembly, Nepal has returned to normalcy with quite astonishing speed. It has reverted to type.
The Constituent Assembly had a truly historic opportunity to set the country on the path to stability and progress, and they blew it. With perfunctory admissions of failure, they seem to have already moved on, while the nation is still reeling from the (non-) constitutional crisis.
On the one hand, Baburam Bhattarai speaks of a consensus government comprising of all key parties. On the other, he couldn't maintain unity even within his own party with Mohan Baidhya’s split. The Koiralas and Sher Bahadur Deuba are at loggerheads in the Nepali Congress and perfectly happy to tear the party apart, while it is difficult to keep track of how many Madhesi parties there now are. With such levels of infighting within parties, it is rather naive to expect that Nepal can have a national unity government, or one for too long anyway.
Bhattarai has said Nepal will go to the polls in November. Now Nepal’s Acting Chief Election Commissioner Neelkantha Upreti has said on record that if elections cannot be conducted in November, then they could potentially be postponed till 13 April, 2013. In a country where nothing happens on time if it involves political leadership, this is an open invitation to the political parties to care even less than they already do. This statement by Upreti could not have come at a worse time. The earlier the country heads to the polls, the less will be the damage the democratic set up, which has been made into some kind of a joke by the four big political parties.
This is the time for Nepal to get its act together. The political parties need to look within before pointing fingers at one another for their failure to write the constitution on time. There are no clear lines being taken by the political parties. While no stone is being left unturned to tear apart the points of views of other parties, no concrete attempts are being made to provide solutions either. Each party is stuck upon its own idea of federalism (whether Nepal should have single ethnicity-based, or multiple ethnicity-based states). The discussions around the federal structure are based on rigid party positions as opposed to the requirements of the country and its people.
At no point in any of these discussions are the prospects of the citizens of the country important. That these politicians are the “representatives” of the Nepalese people escapes them completely.
Post dissolution of the Constituent Assembly, Nepal has returned to normalcy with quite astonishing speed. It has reverted to type.
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