CA polls to be held on November 22

KATHMANDU, June 13: The coalition government of Nepal Sunday announced November 22 (Mangsir 6) as the date for the Constituent Assembly (CA) elections leaving 152 days for the elections.The cabinet meeting held at the Prime Minister's office at Singha Durbar fixed the date for holding the elections."The cabinet or the government is fully confident that the elections will be held on November 22," Krishna Bahadur Mahara, Minister for Information and Communications told journalists coming out of the meeting. "Some of the situations for the elections have already been put in place and we will make progress for creating environment for the others in the days ahead," he said in response to the queries of the journalists. Minister for Peace and Reconstruction Ram Chandra Paudel and Home Minister Krishna Prasad Sitaula only said, "The government fixed the date of CA elections to be held on November 22." The cabinet meeting lasted for about two hours took the decision, but Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala exited at 3:45 pm after about half-an-hour of the meeting.This is the first time in the history of Nepal that the Nepalese people will be going for making constitution through their elected representatives.

The cabinet also provided the Electoral Constituency Delineation Commission 21 days to submit its report. The government, after the parliament passed the second amendment in the interim constitution, had attributed the commission formed under the coordination of former Supreme Court Justice Arjun Prasad Singh to review some technical matters of its earlier report.Fifty-five years ago in 1951 (2007 BS) late King Tribhuwan while declaring the end of Rana oligarchy and establishment of multi-democracy in the country had announced that the people themselves will make their constitution through CA elections. But the election was been put off time and again under different pretexts and never happened.The first ever election to the House of Representatives was held in 1959, with Nepali Congress garnering two-thirds majority, but two years later late king Mahendra couped against the elected government in 1961 and started his direct rule under Panchayat system, which lasted for 30 years until 1990.The interim constitution, which was promulgated on January 15, 2007, had provisioned to hold the constituent assembly elections by mid-June. It could not take place, and the parliament amending the provision on June 13 provisioned that the elections should be held by November.

Earlier Nepal has promulgated five constitutions, the first in 2004 BS which was not implemented, and then in 2007, 2019, 2047 and 2063 BS. None of them were made by the representatives of people. The eight-party meeting held on Saturday had suggested the government to fix the date of the CA elections between November 22 to 26. The interim parliament has already approved four bills related to the elections. People will follow mixed system in the elections as per the 'Constituent Assembly Members' Election Act'. The system includes two methods for the elections ? first past the post and proportional representation systems. People need to cast two votes in separate ballot papers. Under the two methods, each will have 240 seats, making the total number of elected representatives for the assembly at 480. There is also provision for nomination of 17 members by the cabinet from among individuals from different walks of national life making the total strength of the CA as 497.The first meeting of the Constituent Assembly will decide the fate of monarchy as per the provision of the interim constitution.

Source: The Rising Nepal, June 25, 2007