The future of the ordinance is in limbo as it has already been tabled in the Constituent Assembly (CA) for its overseeing. And the provision that gave power to the government to form the three-member committee may not be retained when the CA will pass it.
“So, it is meaningless to recommend names under the Ordinance in this context. So the committee has decided to drop its works till the CA enacts the disappearance law,” said Raman Kumar Shrestha, one of the members of the committee.
On February 27, the government had formed a three-member committee headed by CA member and the chair of the Parliamentary International Relations and Human Rights Committee Padam Lal Biswakarma to recommend five members for the commission that will search for the people made to disappear during the insurgency.
Though the government does not have the exact figures about missing people, the National Human Rights Commission says the whereabouts of more than 1,000 people remains unknown.
The government has not been able to form the commission despite the Supreme Court order on June 1, 2007 and pressure from the victims’ families. In a landmark verdict, the apex court had ordered the government to form an international-standard commission but the ruling is yet to be implemented by the government. On Thursday, the apex court issued yet another order to the government to search for the whereabouts of the people made to disappear by the state and the Maoists during the conflict.
The government promulgated the Disappearance Ordinance in February, inviting criticism from political parties, and national and international human rights groups. They maintained that the ordinance was promulgated without the CA’s overseeing and did not meet international standards.
The ordinance says that a former Supreme Court judge or a person eligible to be an apex court judge will head the commission. It further says that a distinguished jurist, a human rights activist, a woman representative and a sociologist or psychologist will be members of the proposed commission.
“We have already informed the government that the committee is not able to do the assigned work because of the uncertainty over the fate of the ordinance,” said Shrestha, who is also the general Secretary of Nepal Bar Association. “Even if the CA approves the ordinance in its present form, the government may not give continuity to this committee after the law comes in effect.”
kiran@myrepublica.com
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