Faltering again

Jan-5th-2012
The political parties had until yesterday to forge consensus on the forms of governance, as it was the last day as per the Constituent Assembly (CA) work schedule. However, being at odds over the forms of governance, the major three parties could not agree on any one form of governance. While the CPN-UML and UCPN (Maoist) are for a directly elected president and a prime minister chosen by a majority in the parliament, respectively, the Nepali Congress (NC) is for the president elected indirectly by electoral colleges and the election of the prime minister by the parliament.

The discussions over which forms of governance to be endorsed by the dispute resolution sub-committee has stuck due to the rigid stance of the two different streams. This is rather unfortunate that no solution has come about, and the CA work schedule had wanted it done latest by yesterday. Now, the major parties have agreed to revise the Constituent Assembly work schedule, and try to resolve the forms of governance by January 29. However, if it had been endorsed by the resolution sub-committee, the issue would have been included in the first draft of the constitution by the Constitutional Committee, while the unsettled ones were to be forwarded to the CA full house as per the approved CA calendar.

But, in a twist to the series of events, revising the Constituent Assembly calendar of operations has been decided by the Constitutional Committee which will be presented at the CA meet for approving it. With this change of scenario, the major political parties have more time to dwell on and come to consensus on the forms of governance. By the time the agreement on the forms of governance is done, if it is done at all, it will also be the time for the federalism issue to be settled. However, despite the objection of the Maoists and the UML, the calendar is going to be revised as per the intention of NC, which had in fact wanted the CA work schedule revised as it deemed that the forms of governance is related to the restructuring of the state.

What is of specific interest is that the Nepali Congress, a democratic party, is dilly-dallying at the moment with resolving the forms of governance issue. It should have been more responsible in seeing that the issue was resolved according to the calendar of operation. It should also have been more forthcoming than trying to link the forms of governance with the state restructuring issue. Anyway, the agreement on revising the work schedule has been made. Now, it will be worth watching how they will keep their words by forging consensus on the forms of governance by January 29. As it has happened repeatedly, the revisions made in the CA work plan only reflects the intention of asking for more time but serious efforts at resolving the contentious constitutional are nowhere to be seen. When they have not agreed to date, it will be futile to think that it will happen now. The best option would be to send the form of governance as an unsettled issue to the CC, which would be presented to the CA full house for finalising it through the voting procedure.

No progress

It is the duty of the government to ensure the smooth supply and distribution of petroleum products in the country. However, it is only in our country that the government has to be told by the Supreme Court (SC) to take immediate measures to ensure the smooth supply of petroleum products. Moreover, the Essential Services Act is a mere display instead of invoking it to take action against those not abiding by it. In fact, the government owned Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) is not fulfilling as far as the smooth supply of petroleum products is concerned.

It has been over two weeks that the fuel supply has been disrupted owing to the inability of the NOC to import fuels in appropriate quantities. This happened due to the failure of the NOC to pay its dues to the Indian Oil Corporation. Now, things are not observed to be going towards normalisation as the fuel stations are staging their own kind of protests. The hapless consumers are at their wit’s end as when will there be a real return to uninterrupted supply of fuel supplies, despite paying whatever rate is fixed by NOC. It is all sans accountability and transparency as far as NOC and the government is concerned.

Hima...