KATHMANDU, Jan 24: With the provincial assemblies getting full shape last week, the newly-appointed governors have started homework for summoning the first provincial assembly meetings in all seven provinces as the constitutional deadline for the same inches closer.
According to Article 183 of the new constitution, the first session of the provincial assembly should be summoned within 20 days after the final result of the provincial assembly election is declared. The Election Commission (EC) declared the results of 550 members of seven provincial assemblies on January 19 formally submitting the poll results to the respective province governors.
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Governor of Province 4, Baburam Kunwar telephoned Law Minister Yagya Bahadur Thapa and Law Secretary Kamalsali Ghimire on Tuesday to ask them about the procedure for summoning the provincial assembly sessions. “We have just two weeks left for summoning the provincial assembly sessions but the Election Commission is yet to provide us the details of the elected members of the provincial assembly,” Kunwar told Republica over the telephone on Tuesday. He further said that he has planned the first session of his province by the end of January.
President Bidya Bhandari has invited the governors of all seven provinces for a meeting on coming Sunday. The governors who talked to Republica said that they have expected ideas about office operation from the president in the meeting as most of the duties and responsibilities of the governors are similar to those of the president, albeit at the provincial level.
Province 1 Governor Govinda Subba said that he has been planning to summon the provincial assembly session after holding a meeting with all political parties represented in the provincial assembly. Likewise, Province 7 Governor Mohanraj Malla has been consulting with the governors of other provinces for summoning the province assembly session. According to secretary at the Governor's Office, Yubaraj Subedi, Malla has started homework for summoning the session within the constitutional deadline.
The constitution states that the election of province speaker and deputy speaker should be held within 15 days of the first meeting of the provincial assembly.
