KATHMANDU, SEPTEMBER 6
The government accepted lawmakers' proposal seeking withdrawal of provisions from the bill to amend some acts that intended to determine the end of the five-year term of the House of Representatives and provincial assemblies till the first meeting of the House after the November 20 elections.
Responding to lawmakers' queries on the bill in the HoR today, Minister of Law, Justice, and Parliamentary Affairs Govinda Bandi said today that the government decided to withdraw the proposal to determine the tenure of the HoR and provincial assemblies till the first meeting of the House after November 20 elections as both ruling and opposition parties opposed the provision.
He said the government brought the bill with the sincere objective of ending uncertainty about the end of the five-year term and the House could have reached a conclusion on the date which might not necessarily be the date proposed by the government, but lawmakers demanded withdrawal of the government's proposal.
Bandi said since there was confusion about the date that could mark the end of the five-year term with people proposing different dates, it was necessary to end the uncertainty. "There are five proposals on when the HoR's tenure should end: the day before nomination papers are filed, the day before elections are held, the day final election results are declared by the EC, the day the first meeting of the new House is called, or the day when the newly elected members are sworn in," Bandi said.
Nepali Congress lawmaker Gagan Kumar Thapa said the government might have brought the bill to extend the tenure of the House till the first meeting of the new House in an attempt to avoid political vacuum, but had the government brought the bill before local polls, people would not have questioned the intention of the government as they were doing now. He said the government did not build opinion in favour of the bill and that was perhaps the reason why some people were giving an impression that the government brought the bill with the sole intention of providing pay and perks to lawmakers for extra one or two months.
CPN-UML lawmakers also opposed the government's proposal to extend the tenure of the HoR beyond the filing of nomination papers for elections.
Yesterday, Rastriya Prajatantra Party lawmaker Rajendra Lingden announced his resignation from the rostrum of the House opposing the government's move to extend the tenure of lawmakers beyond the filing of nominations for November 20 elections. The Election Commission had also issued a press release yesterday opposing the government's move, arguing that it had already been established before that the tenure of HoR members and PA members should end on the eve of filing of nomination papers for new elections.
A version of this article appears in the print on September 7, 2022 of The Himalayan Times.
