Parties doing little to meet deadline

KATHMANDU, DEC 18 -
Even almost a month after the November 19 CA election, the major political parties have not started selecting candidates under the proportional representation category owing to their internal feuds.

The Election Commission extended the deadline for PR list submission twice, but only 11 parties , out of 30 eligible, have named their candidates. The big three parties — Nepali Congress, CPN-UML and UCPN (Maoist)—are falling behind schedule.

NC leaders have demanded that their leadership hold an intensive discussion in the party’s Central Working Committee (CWC) to finalise the PR candidates. Despite the fact that the party’s Parliamentary Board is the only body to select candidates, they say the CWC should make a clear policy to that effect.

“We will knock the door of the Election Commission if the party leaders fail to convince us of the PR selection process,” said NC leader Gagan Thapa. Leaders have agreed to make a policy on PR selection through a CWC meeting beginning Wednesday. Party sources said the top leaders—Sushil Koirala, Sher Bahadur Deuba and Ram Chandra Poudel—have nominated an increasing number of leaders in the PR category from their respective constituencies.

Koirala alone has forwarded more than half a dozen leaders from his Banke-3 and Chitwan-4 constituencies, while Poudel and Deuba have selected an equal number of candidates. Influential leaders like Prakash Man Singh, Krishna Prasad Sitaula and Ram Saran Mahat have their own lists. “Out of 90 seats under the PR, we have to allocate seats for women, Dalits, Janajatis and Madhesis as per the Election Commission’s provision. So we are having tough time finalising the names,” said NC General Secretary Krishna Prasad Sitaula.

The UML is in the same boat. Its Standing Committee, mandated to pick PR candidates from the closed list, is yet to begin discussions. The committee was supposed to name its candidates by December 17. But the selection process, according to leaders, got delayed after the deadline to submit the list was extended by the EC on Monday for the second time till December 25.

“The new deadline has pushed internal discussions on the back burner as we have the culture of working at the eleventh hour. I think senior leaders will finalise the name list just a day ahead of the deadline,” said UML leader Bhim Rawal.

The UML has won 84 seats under the PR category. The EC provision has it that the lists should include 50 percent women, 13 percent Dalits, 37 percent indigenous nationalities and oppressed groups, 30 percent seats to others and 5 percent for backward areas.

In a bid to ease the selection process, the party has tasked its top leaders to select 50 percent of the total candidates from the local committees and remaining from the Central Committee and central bodies. It has urged to prioritise the leaders with expertise on constitution writing and not to include those who were in the first CA.

Similarly, the UCPN (Maoist), which has been demanding that electoral ‘irregularities’ be probed, has begun an internal homework to finalise its PR candidates. According to leaders, the selection process is an uphill task for the party, as there are just 50 seats it got under the PR category, while the number of aspiring candidates is high.

On Monday, UCPN (Maoist) Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal, in the High Level Political Committee meeting,  had proposed an extension of the deadline to submit PR lists, a sign that the party is ready to join the new CA. 

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