Koirala, Deuba call separate meets

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KATHMANDU, JAN 24 - Top two Nepali Congress leaders President Sushil Koirala and senior leader Sher Bahadur Deuba are holding separate gatherings of lawmakers on Friday in capital in their bid to muster support to win the party parliamentary leadership race.

Another hopeful, party Vice-president Ram Chandra Poudel held a gathering on Thursday at his residence in Bohoratar where around 65 lawmakers participated.

While Koirala and Deuba camps are claiming the majority votes in their favour, Poudel is believed to be trailing behind the two.

The NC statute provisions the party parliamentary leader as the natural candidate for the post of prime

minister.

During the gathering at Poudel’s residence, a majority of the lawmakers suggested Poudel to reach out to Koirala and Deuba and strike a deal. Some party lawmakers like Ram Saran Mahat, Krishna Prasad Situala, Minendra Rijal have piled pressure on three leaders to come together and agree on a honourable power deal.

“All three of them are weighing their strength but we are trying to forge an understanding among them. We are trying our best to seek a common ground,” said Mahat.

Similarly, some leaders have warned that if the NC holds the election to the parliamentary leader, it would have direct impact on constitution drafting process which would make it difficult to draft a constitution within a year.

“I have made it clear to the leaders that dividing the party in the name of selecting the parliamentary leader will only make the constitution drafting a distant dream,” said another NC leader Shekhar Koirala.

The party is holding an election to the post on Sunday at party parliamentary office in Singha Durbar.

“This is not the time to divide and polarise the internal politics,” lawmakers were reported to have told Poudel on Thursday. In response, Poudel said that efforts are under way to forge consensus for a unanimous leader.

Some leaders have suggested a compromise formula before the party goes to the polls, to resolve the power struggle in the party, said another party leader.    

NC tables procedures draft

The Nepali Congress (NC) on Thursday floated a draft of Constituent Assembly (CA) rules of procedures which aims at promulgating a new constitution within a year.

CA Meeting Operations and Procedures Suggestions Committee formed by the NC last week submitted the draft at the Parliament Secretariat, expecting the parties to discuss and build on it.

NC leader Nara Hari Acharya-led panel has suggested that contentious issues should be decided through voting if thematic committees fail to settle in a given time-frame.

The NC has proposed only three thematic committees in the new CA—Political Dialogue Committee, Constitution Drafting Committee and Public Feedback Collection Committee—arguing that the parties should take ownership of the work executed by the previous CA. “We have submitted a draft of rules of procedures which has proposed a clear roadmap to promulgate a new constitution within a year,” Parvati DC Chaudhary, a member of NC draft committee told Post.

The CPN-UML is apparently on the same page with the NC but things have not been formally discussed yet. The Rastriya Prajatantra Party-Nepal (RPP-N), which has emerged as the fourth largest party in the CA, has warned that it would protest in the House if the parties took the ownership of the progress made by the previous CA. But in its proposal, the NC has proposed to take the ownership of

the progress made by previous CA.

Via:ekantipur