Term Extension

Prime Minister Madav Kumar Nepal´s directive to the Home Ministry to extend the terms of 16 high ranking police officers who technically retired on Wednesday has stirred controversy. Home Minister Bhim Rawal has taken a strong stance against the term extension while the rest of his cabinet colleagues have stood behind the prime minister. Term extension for the retired cops is a crucial issue with serious ramifications. The circumstances surrounding the term extension and the fact that the prime minister intervened over the issue at the eleventh hour suggest that something is amiss with the process.



News reports say that the prime minister called the acting chief secretary from the airport just before boarding the plane for Egypt on his way to the NAM summit and directed him to write to the Home Ministry to stay the retirement of the top cops. Reports also claim that the prime minister´s intervention came after Nepali Congress President Girija Prasad Koirala urged him to do so. It is still unclear why Koirala threw his weight behind the outgoing police officials and "persuaded" the prime minister to go out of his way to retain them.



As Home Minister Rawal has already taken up a proposal to implement a 30-year service-term limit in the Nepal Police, as has already been done in the Armed Police Force and the National Investigation Department, he has refused to back down. This has resulted in a serious stand-off between the prime minister and his confidant, the home minister. In a prime ministerial system, such as ours, a minister who has serious differences with the prime minister has no option but to quit. And Minister Rawal has already indicated such a possibility in this case. Even at Thursday´s cabinet meeting Rawal reportedly said that he would resign once the prime minister returned to the country.



This rift is a bad omen. Rawal is among the very few talented young leaders in the UML and lately he had shown some resolve to take on the growing anarchy in the country and restore law and order. Prime Minister Nepal had himself worked hard to persuade Rawal to join his cabinet as home minister. That the prime minister has failed to take him into confidence on this particular issue and sent a written directive from his office to the Home Ministry puts both Rawal and Prime Minister Nepal in an awkward situation. As things now stand the prime minister has either to back down or be ready to sacrifice the man he had chosen to improve the law and order situation, his topmost priority. Either option will be a setback for the government.

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