The four major parties—Nepali Congress, CPN-UML, UCPN (Maoist) and the Madheshi People's Rights Forum (Democratic)—have decided to "try" their best in accommodating people's feedback on the draft constitution. It's a welcome decision. This will not only honor people's views but also help in gaining popular legitimacy of the constitution, which will be vital for its sustainability. But this, we are afraid, is easier said than done. People have voiced their opinion for and against contentious constitutional issues like secularism and delineation of state provinces (with not more than five provinces) before promulgation of the constitution. A major portion of the population wants a directly elected executive head, at least five percent threshold for a political party to become a national party, constitutional guarantee of special allowances to the elderly, women's reproductive rights, and employment to youth, death penalty to rapists, murderers and corrupt officials, reduction of number of seats under Proportional Representation system and so on. It will be tough for political actors to accommodate all these views. But the feedback collection phase has made one thing clear: people are not as indifferent toward politics as is thought in Kathmandu and they are aware about the mess that is going on in the country. This awakening and huge public participation will be a big boost to strengthening our democracy.Constituent Assembly has received altogether 33,016 suggestions through various means. Of them, 20,722 suggestions came through CA's official website, 8,800 through emails, 2,471 through toll-free telephone number, 1,080 through fax, and 243 through postal service and direct submissions. This does not include volumes of feedback collected during public hearings held in 240 constituencies across the country last week. The CA secretariat should document each of them and submit it to the CA. However, a growing demand for directly elected executive head, setting qualification requirement for lawmakers and ministers, and extreme punitive measures against perpetrators of heinous crimes suggest that people have had enough of misrule, lack of accountability and instability and they want rule of law, competent politicians and good governance to prevail. Our political actors should find ways to address people's genuine concerns.
Be that as it may, it will be even more challenging for the Big Four to prioritize and accommodate people's concerns. They stand at a Catch—22 situation. They cannot ignore people's call nor can they accommodate them all by August 16, their deadline to promulgate the constitution. The Big Four will have work on war footing and use the next twenty days also to address the concerns of the dissenting parties. Let us not forget that a number of people have supported naming and delineation of the provinces before the constitution, as has been demanded by agitating parties. While there is a huge responsibility on political parties to ensure the people that under no condition will the post-2006 achievements—most importantly federalism, republicanism and inclusion—be undone, they also have to impress on people that they heed the people not only during elections, but also during the most crucial time of drafting new constitution.
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