Mani Thapa, a member of the talks team of the agitating alliance, said that Monday´s talks couldn´t move in positively as the government remained rigid over the election date.
"They repeatedly insisted that the scheduled election date cannot be changed arguing that the government´s hands are tied legally and constitutionally," Thapa, chief of the Revolutionary Communist Party Nepal, told Republica. "This is unacceptable for us because we had agreed to sit for talks only after the government promised to maintain maximum flexibility if we were ready to participate in the elections." [break]
He said while the alliance of the agitating parties insisted on seeking national consensus through a roundtable of all the parties, the government side argued that the Constituent Assembly (CA) itself would be the best platform for seeking consensus on major political issues.
According to him, the government side wasn´t positive about the idea of a rountable as the ministers believed that forging consensus among scores of political parties would be impractical. "Members of the government talks team argued that seeking a solution at an all-party roundtable may be a never-ending debate and we might again be trapped in a quagmire," said Thapa.
Minister for Information and Communications, Madhav Paudel said that their main focus during the talks was to persuade the agitating parties to participate in the November elections. "Our main emphasis was to persuade them to particpate in the November 19 elections," said Paudel. "We have yet to reach an agreement."
CPN-Maoist Secretary Dev Gurung, who heads the talks team of the agitating alliance, said that they couldn´t reach any conclusion "as the government side argued that election is the solution to everything, we underscored the need for forging national consensus through a roundtable participated by all political forces."
Alliance urges govt to mediate for roundtable
The 33-party agitating alliance that had earlier launched protests against the decision to form the present government led by the chief justice saying that it was blatant violation of the principle of separation of powers has now requested the same government to play the role of mediator to convene an all-party roundtable conference to discuss major political issues.
"We urged the government to play the role of a mediator among the parties because the four-party´s High Level Political Committee couldn´t do that," said Gurung.
Thapa argued that they proposed the government to be a mediator because they have already accepted the legitimacy of this government by joining in the talks with the government.
The 33-party alliance led by CPN-Maoist had earlier described the present government as an illegitimate body and demanded dissolution of this government.
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