Home Minister Kamal Thapa said on Sunday that political parties willing, an all-party government could be formed anytime. It is true that attempts at having such a formation were earlier made by the Chand-government and now by the Thapa government. But the political parties have been quick to point out time and again that neither of these post-October 4 government had the "constitutional" legitimacy to do so. The parties, especially those representing in the dissolved House of the Representatives, however, have been questioning the constitutionality of these two governments; whether they possessed any authority to form an all-party government in the first place. No amount of coaxing has since succeeded in selling the idea of an all-party government to the agitating parties. The King also granted audience to a host of leaders of the agitating parties individually and once collectively asking them to come up with a consensus candidate for the premiership. Some of them agreed on Madhav Kumar Nepal of the CPN-UML as a suitable candidate for the job while others disagreed. Since then, the idea of an all-party government has appeared rather dormant. The fact that a strong demand for such a government has existed for quite sometime now, it remains to be seen if it will ever be formed and allowed to deal with the on-going crisis — more so after the King professed to work towards building amicable atmosphere within this year in order to conduct elections.

If the agitating parties had their reservations on the constitutionality of a government formed under Article 127 to form an all-party government for the last one and half year, what is it that makes Kamal Thapa so confident about the prospect of such an arrangement now? The parties have not changed their stand and the political situation today is hardly different from what it was when the royal intervention came. While there is little disagreement over the fact that a government of parties represented in the dissolved Lower House is the best way forward, it is, however, not an easy chore either. As if all these were not intricate enough, the fresh allegations by the home minister that "the government has solid evidence of Maoist infiltration in the recent protests" and that "except NC and CPN-UML, leaders of other parties have been in touch with Maoists to discuss their protest plans" will only undermine the chances of any sort of cooperation between the parties and the government. If true, the public as much as the government, will be enlightened about the shadow nexus between some parties and the rebels. As the NC and CPN-UML are known to have met the rebel leaders in India earlier, the onus of proving fresh allegations, however, now rests on the government.