At a meeting held with the Chairman of Interim Election Council of Ministers Khil Raj Regmi at his official residence in Baluwatar Monday morning, senior leaders of the parties represented in HLPC asked the government to fully focus on the election related works. [break]
The request of major political parties to the government comes in the wake of Supreme Court on Monday issuing an interim order against the agreement with India to allow the latter to upgrade the immigration system at the Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA) and to set up Indian immigration check points in Lumbini and Pashupatinagar. “Whether the decisions were right or wrong is altogether a different matter. The question is why is the government is taking decisions of such nature?” said UCPN (Maoist) Vice Chairman Narayan Kaji Shrestha.
On the occasion, government ministers had replied that they had not taken the decision with any ill-intention.
The meeting also dwelled on ways to deal with the constitutional difficulties relating to constituency delineation. While one constitutional provision states that the number of electoral constituencies should be adjusted in accordance with new census report, another constitutional provision bars increasing the number of constituencies. “We have decided to sit again for talks within the next few days,” said Shrestha.
Besides reaching to an agreement to giving full shape to the constitutional bodies and appointing ambassadors in vacant positions, the meeting also discussed ways to bring the agitating parties on board the electoral process. Both HLPC and the government will take necessary initiatives to bring the agitating parties on board the electoral process.
In line with the decision to make utmost efforts to appease the agitating parties, HLPC had held a joint meeting with CPN-ML General Secretary CP Mainali, CPN (Samyukta) Chairman Chandra Dev Joshi and Rastriya Janamorcha Chairman Chitra Bahadur KC. “They have told us that they are positive about participating in election under the current Khil Raj Regmi-led government,” said Shrestha.
Shrestha said that they reached an understanding that changing government leadership at this point in time would only defer the election. “Since a majority of the constituent parties of the Mohan Baidya-led alliance have already come onboard the election process, we are hopeful that other agitating parties will also eventually join the poll process,” he said.
HLPC coordinator Bijaya Kumar Gachchhadar during the meeting had handed over the convenorship to UCPN (Maoist) Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal on Monday´s meeting as per the agreement between the parties to head the committee on rotational basis. The one-month term of Gachchhadar in HLPC expired on Monday.
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