Internal Political Developments

Once again Peace-Process comes to a halt; it Hits Statute Writing Also: Along with the Maoist party’s precondition to advance peace process as agreed in the 7-point agreement signed on November 1, 2011, the statute writing process is also facing a serious problems in Nepal. The first meeting of the Constitutional Committee (CC), under the Constituent Assembly (CA) after revision of the CA calendar ended inconclusively on January 7, 2012.

Though the leaders discussed the report submitted by the UCPN (Maoist) Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal-led Dispute Resolution Sub-Committee (DRSC), they failed to endorse any of the agreements. There are over 60 outstanding contentious issues, including the forms of governance that are awaiting political decision at the CC.

The main opposition Nepali Congress (NC) states that progress in the peace process is a pre-condition for resolving the contentious issues of constitution making. It seems that the NC is irked by the change of mind by the Maoist party with regard to bidding farewell to the combatants opting for voluntary retirement. The process of discharging the combatants choosing voluntary retirement was supposed to start by January 8, 2011, according to the decision taken by the prime minister-led Special Committee last week. “The Maoists want to retain the cantonments and combatants till the next elections. The new constitution will not be promulgated if they continue showing reluctance in completing the peace process,” the NC leadership state.

However, Maoist leaders argue that the NC’s decision to backtrack from the agreement on forms of governance is the reason behind the current stalemate. According to the Maoist leaders, all parties, including the NC, had agreed in a taskforce meeting led by lawmaker Laxman Lal Karna to recommend a mixed model with sharing of executive powers between a directly elected president and a prime minister elected by the parliament. However, the NC leadership say that their party has never consented to the report of the taskforce but has shown flexibility in recent days to forge consensus on forms of governance.

The problem arises when the major parties insist not to go beyond their own stand on the forms of government. The United Communist Party of Nepal (UCPN-M) is insisting on the executive president stating that it would be a step forward from the Westminster model but the Nepali Congress and the CPN-UML are in favour of the executive prime minister loyal to the parliament. It is the NC, which has been claiming that a directly elected president is unsuitable for Nepal because it can give birth to a new dictator. However, Maoist Chairperson Pushpa Kamal Dahal has told NC leaders that the peace process cannot move ahead if their party disagrees on the presidential system.

Addressing the House session on January 8, 2012, opposition leader Ram Chandra Poudel said the Maoist party is deviating from the task of concluding the peace process and that the party is active in "reversing" consensus struck between major parties on constitutional issues. He accused the Maoist party and leadership of trying to promulgate the new constitution under the 'shadow of the gun.'

"We sense that the Maoists want to promulgate the new constitution and participate in the next elections by keeping the cantonments and the army with them. That is unacceptable," he said. "We are deeply worried about the recent deviation by the Maoists. The Maoist chairman and the Prime Minister should make a fresh commitment to restore trust among the parties."

He, also, said that constitution drafting cannot make headway until the peace process sees a logical conclusion. He stressed on the implementation of the November 1 peace deal, arguing that the agreement clearly mentions that rank determination, bridging course and training to be imparted to Maoist combatants would be decided by the Nepal Army.

Maoist Party is Likely to Set Aside Differences: Once both the peace process and statute writing there has not been much progress and the UCPN-M factions seem to be making efforts to settle their intra-party rift which has been there for months. As the party took hard-line position on the statute writing process, both the Dahal and Baidya factions are working on a common position on the party’s immediate policy and programmes, keeping their ideological differences at bay. It is said that the move become possible when Chairman Dahal assured his deputy and hardliner leader Mohan Baidya that the “revolt” is “inevitable” if national and international forces hatch conspiracies against the peace process. Dahal has appealed to the hardliners that both the party establishment and the hard-line faction should look at preparing a common document on the party’s immediate programme and policies. It is also said that, Dahal tried to persuade the hard-line leader by saying that the party had not surrendered to the parliamentary forces on its core issues of combatant integration and constitution-writing.

However, Baidya group responded that immediate resignation of Prime Minister Baburam Bhattarai could be a compromise with Dahal. However, Prime Minister Bhattarai on January 3 said that he would not quit just because some people told him to do so. Inaugurating a convention in Biratnagar today, Bhattarai said, “The present government would not resign without concluding peace process and constitution writting.” Claiming that the present government was formed to complete the pending tasks of the constitution and peace process, he said that the present government would finish what it has started. Prime Minister Bhattarai claimed that the present government has done a lot for peace and constitution within the past three months; which the former governments has failed to accomplish. He said that the people have trusted this government; therefore, it would not dissolve for some alleged rumours.

Foreign Relations

Relations with India

India Drops Demand for Sky Marshal, Extradition Treaty: A High-level government sources said that India has decided not to pursue two key items on its security agenda with Nepal—the demand for placing sky marshals on flights originating in India and signing of a revised Extradition Treaty and the Mutual Legal Assistance. Those were the two major items which used to dominate the Indian list during bilateral meetings and talks for years. It is said that India had decided not to raise the issue for the time being during Bhattarai’s visit to India last October. That is why both the items weren’t included in the joint communiqué.

By Uddhab Pyakurel