Skip to main content

Madhesi leaders float 3 proposals to end row

Deadlock over boundary
Registration of a constitution amendment bill has but complicated politics, and with protests erupting in different parts of the country and the Madhes-based parties refusing to take ownership of the bill in existing form, the government seems to be in a tight spot. 
Amid this, top leaders of the Madhes-based forces in the past few days are learnt to have floated three proposals before the governing parties to end the boundary row.
According to leaders privy to the meetings between the Madhes-based forces and the governing parties, Madhesi leaders “categorically” advised Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal either to set up a federal commission and entirely revise the federal boundaries or scrap the existing seven-Province model. 
According to the leaders, a new constitution amendment proposal can be drafted after that to ensure elections. The second proposal floated by the Madhesi leaders is adhering to the report prepared by the State Restructuring Commission. 
The third proposal calls for adjusting the “disputed” districts of Provinces 2 and 5.
The current constitution amendment bill that the government has registered envisions splitting Province 5 but does not mentiond about five “disputed” districts—Jhapa, Morang and Sunsari in the East and Kailali and Kanchanpur in the West. The plan to split Province 5 has sparked protests, with thousands of people descending on central Butwal on Friday. 
A top leader from a party in the government said that “the Madhesi leaders have clearly told us that there should be two provinces in Tarai/ Madhes where western and southern parts of Morang and Sunsari can be incorporated into Province 2 and eastern part of Kailai district can be incorporated into Province 5.” 
“They have proposed setting up a federal commission and giving it three to six months to come up with a report, and based on that report, a new constitution amendment bill can be drafted so as to ensure elections,” the leader said. Talking to reporters on Friday, Tarai Madhesh Loktantrik Party (TMLP) Chairman Mahantha Thakur said that the row over federal boundaries can be resolved by following the recommendations of the State Restructuring Commission. 
The commission had come up with a report suggesting two provinces along the plains with Jhapa, Morang and Sunsari being part of Province 2 and Kailai and Kanchanpur of Province 5.
“The whole Nawalparasi district should be incorporated in one province,” he said. “But, if Nawalparasi can be split, why not Jhapa, Morang, Sunsari, Kailali or Kanchanpur for that matter?” 
Three major parties had earlier rejected the State Restructuring Commission’s report, saying that two provinces along the plains “was not possible”.
“We are still holding discussions with the Madhes-based parties to end the boundary row,” said senior Maoist Centre leader Narayan Kaji Shrestha. He, however, insisted that declaring the dates of local level elections is the “best option available right now”. “If consensus cannot be forged on the amendment bill, the government should declare the elections.” 
Suggestions
- Set up a federal commission and entirely revise the federal boundaries, or scrap the existing seven-province model
- Adhere to the report prepared by the State Restructuring Commission
- Adjust  ‘disputed’ districts of Provinces 2 and 5

Anil Giri
Published: 03-12-2016

The Kathmandu Post

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Bhattarai stresses on rebuilding Nepal-India ties

- Kamal Dev Bhattarai Former Prime Minister and Coordinator of Naya Shakti Nepal Baburam Bhattarai has said that there is a lack of ‘proper understanding’ in India about Nepal. Speaking to Post before concluding his visit to India on Tuesday, leader Bhattarai said mainly young generation of India has some flawed understanding about Nepal and bilateral relations between the two countries. The former prime minister maintained that there is a need of dialogue, debate and discussions to rebuild the bilateral relations in the change political context Nepal and India. Bhattarai made such remark after extensive discussions with Indian intellectual and policy makers during his seven-day stay in New Delhi.  Bhattarai underlined the need for building a bilateral relation between two countries at the top political levels. Bhattarai was of the view that there has been a huge change in the political scenario of both countries and bilateral relation should be rebuilt accordingly. He ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Reduce Poverty: Much Neglected

Dilli Raj Khanal A progressive distributional policy together with the suitable institutional setups and arrangements at the grassroots for ensuring exclusively the access of poor to social and physical infrastructure as well as financial services is also a necessity . As a part of global event, poverty eradication day was celebrated in Nepal recently with claims that Nepal is one of the best performers in this area. If estimated poverty trends are looked into, there are no grounds to refute such an assertion. According to official figures, in 20 year’s period poverty has reduced by more than 20 per cent, from 41.8 per cent in 1995/96 to 21.2 per cent in 2015/16. Compared to the average GDP growth rate of 3.7 per cent in that period, the poverty reduction rate was about 3.2 per cent per annum. The breakdown by different updated poverty estimated periods give an interesting pattern. For instance, the annual poverty reduction rate was sharpest at 3.7 per cent annually during ...
Post a Comment
Read more

House panel has decided 3 % threshold provision

State Affairs Committee of the Parliament has decided to impose a threshold of three percent and at least one seat under the First-Past-the-Post electoral system to secure seats under the proportional representation system. The committee meeting on Wednesday took the decision to impose the threshold. Earlier, a sub committee formed by the committee decided to impose 3 percent threshold in the upcoming parliamentary election to become national political party. According to the subcommittee member Rameshwor Phuyal, the 27th meeting of the panel decided to provision three percent threshold after the rigorous discussion.  "Any political party must secure at least three percent seat under the Proportional Representation (PR) category and at least one seat under First-Past-the-Post category to become the national political party," said Phuyal.  He hailed the decision of the 11-member panel as historic. The sub-committee was failing to endorse the Bill Related to ...
Post a Comment
Read more