The extension session preceded a political deal between the main three of 25 parties represented in the assembly, requiring Madhav Kumar Nepal to quit the post of interim prime minister so that a new government of national consensus could be formed and the task of writing the constitution gain momentum.
The written, three-point deal on an extension, it is conceded, was backed by verbal commitments for its speedy implementation. Accordingly, a legislative resolution to give the Constituent Assembly an extended lease of life was adopted while the public mood swung between ambivalence and apprehension.
While there was a sense of anger against the leaders of the political parties who not only failed to offer even a public apology for their visible incompetence to finish their given task within the original mandate, an element of fear and uncertainty compelled the hapless population to support the extension without detailed scrutiny.
On May 28, several groups of civil society and social organizations staged rallies outside the assembly building, chanting slogans with a demand that the Constituent Assembly must not be allowed to die, or else revivalist forces would raise their ugly heads, ultimately destroying the gains made through the April uprising of 2006 that led to the abolition of the monarchy in May 2008.
Nepali intelligentsia had a different view on developments, considering the pre-extension drama as being prompted by greedy politicians and as nothing but a ploy to cheat innocent voters, largely concentrated in rural areas. In this opinion, what can be politically expedient may not necessarily be constitutionally correct.
The interim constitution does have a provision for an extension of six months, but that is permitted only when the country is under emergency rule. Any attempt to go beyond this limit is an unconstitutional act.
"The regime that exists now, after the death of legitimacy [from May 29] is devoid of relevance as well as rationality," columnist Anaarsingh Karki wrote on May 30. People could defy laws and refuse to pay taxes, he added.
The international community, however, has not bothered much on the question of legitimacy. The United Nations, the United States, the European Union, Japan and Nepal's immediate neighbors issued statements welcoming the extension. In doing so, Nepal's friends and partners (except India) understandably attached due importance to the point related to the promise of the early formation of a government of national unity. Some even praised political leaders for having put national interests ahead of partisan politics.
But expectations are being belied. "It looks like there was a tacit understanding among negotiating leaders," assembly member Tilak Rawal told a newspaper "to avert the constitutional crisis and then revert to their divergent positions." Rawal belongs to a south-based regional party that is a part of the incumbent interim coalition.
That the resolution adopted on May 28 was just an instrument to avert a constitutional crisis is a widely-held perception, the first proof of this perception has surfaced in the form of the refusal by the prime minister to step down to open the way for the formation of a national-unity government.
Mr Nepal's supporters now insist that his opponents should first produce an outline of a national government because the prime minister cannot quit office before his successor is identified. On the other hand, the opposition does not buy this contention, saying that initiatives for identifying an alternative candidate can only begin after the present incumbent leaves the chair. "Mr Nepal will see a leader emerging to take over from him while he stays on as the head of a caretaker government for a few days," Krishna Bahadur Mahara, a senior Maoist leader, told Asia Times Online.
The party Mahara belongs to, the Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), is the largest in the assembly, with nearly 40% of seats. The Nepali Congress, the oldest party with democratic credentials, has second position. The party Mr Nepal is associated with, the Unified Marxist-Leninist (UML), occupies third position.
Together, these three parties command the two-thirds majority that will be required to eventually adopt a new constitution. Other regional and fringe parties do not have a decisive say in the assembly.
Media reports on May 28 indicated that Mr Nepal faced a considerable challenge from within his own party, and he agreed to step down in five days. That was how the stalemate was broken, and the extension made possible. Had he not made that offer, Maoist leader Pushpa Kamal Dahal (also known as Prachanda) would not have directed his comrades in the assembly to vote for the extension.
But what has ensued, says New Spotlight magazine, is essentially an extension of confusion. A recalcitrant prime minister is striking evidence of this.
Mr Nepal's behavior might have something to do with New Delhi.
While the rest of the international community, including the UN, saw the need for a national-unity government to take Nepal's peace process to its logical end, statements from the Indian capital continued to express support for the government headed by Mr Nepal.
It began in Thimphu, Bhutan, where Mr Nepal had a one-to-one meeting with his Indian counterpart, Manmohan Singh, on the sidelines of a regional conference.
India is keen to block Prachanda from leading the next coalition government, but its apparent meddling is helping spread anti-Indian sentiment across the country.
"Indian policy towards Nepal needs to avoid the misjudgments and mistakes of the past," the Hindu, a prominent Indian newspaper, wrote in an editorial on June 1. That continued Indian interference has become an obstacle to the peace process was also a subject of diplomatic debate when British International Development Minister Alan Duncan visited Nepal last week (26-28 May).
While Western powers generally tend to accept a role for "regional actors" (India and China) in keeping Nepal as a stable and democratic buffer between competing Asian giants, they do not necessarily approve of everything New Delhi does.
The Western stand on the issue found expression in a talk given on the rise of India by US Under Secretary of State William J Burns on Tuesday at the Council on Foreign Relations.
While he supported India's leadership role in its immediate neighborhood encompassing Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka, the US diplomat made it clear that although some policy prescriptions might converge, the US and India had their own independent assessments of the situation in the region. "Neither of us intends to outsource South Asia policy to the other," was how Burns clarified the US stand.
For now, implementation of the three-point deal is crucial for expediting the constitution-writing process. Once it clears the way for the promulgation of a new constitution, Nepal's transformation from a monarchy to a republic would begin taking root.
No comments:
Post a Comment