Political parties must be ready to pass the bill as it is to make the electoral system more effective
Should the Federal Parliament endorse the new integrated Election Bill as proposed by the Election Commission (EC), the country will witness sweeping reforms in the election system, making the political parties more accountable to the electorate. The new bill has integrated seven election-related laws, which aims at ensuring 100 per cent voting during the election. Some of the major reforms proposed by the EC in the bill include the provisions to bar people elected to the House of Representatives (HoR) and provincial assemblies under the Proportional Representation (PR) system from contesting the PR election for a third time and barring people who have lost an election from contesting the election again from other constituencies during the same tenure of the elected body, with the exception of the by-election from the same constituency. The integrated bill has also proposed giving the voters a "no vote" option under which if the option reaches 50 per cent of the total valid votes cast, the election will be nullified. It has also proposed giving voting rights to those Nepalis living abroad to cast votes from their respective places, and allowing early voting than the voting date. The bill has suggested fixing the voting date so that the people will know which day of which year the election will take place in advance.
All the political parties are also required to field at least 33 per cent of women candidates under the First-Past-the-Post (FPtP) system, and if a political party fields only one candidate for the post of chief and deputy-chief of the local level, then the party must field a woman candidate.
Till date, the political parties fulfil the legal requirement of 33per cent women candidates from the PR list, in which most of them are wives and other family members of the powerful leaders of the political parties. Counting of votes should be held at the concerned polling centres to make the counting process transparent. Chief Election Commissioner Dinesh Kumar Thapaliya said he was expecting the government to register the new bill at the parliament in the next three weeks.
Although the EC has proposed sweeping reforms in the election system, it is unlikely that the government will register the bill within the next three weeks, and endorse it as it is. Given their vested political interests, the major political parties will be averse to the idea of the no-vote, two-term provision for PR candidates, 33 per cent women candidacies under the FPtP, fixing the polling date and voting rights for migrant workers and others from abroad. It may be recalled that the Supreme Court had ordered the government to ensure migrants' voting right in 2018. But the government and the major political parties have not held even preliminary deliberation on such voting rights. If the bill is endorsed by the federal parliament without changes, Nepal's election system will become more effective. This is a good initiative of the EC, which should be backed by people from all walks of life. Democracy cannot mature and reach the grass-roots level until and unless the electoral system is reformed time and again. The public should mount pressures on the major political parties so that the next general and local level elections in 2027 could be held under the Integrated Election Act.
Lumpy skin disease
Lumpy skin disease (LSD) has reached epidemic proportions in the country this year, with tens of thousands of cattle already killed as a result, causing huge losses to the farmers. LSD was first reported in Nepal in June 2020, and sporadic outbreaks of the highly contagious viral disease of the cattle were seen now and then, but it was never as serious as it is today. The disease has infected cows and buffaloes in two-thirds of Nepal's 77 districts this year, with no solution to it in sight yet. Sudurpaschim Province in particular has witnessed a higher number of infected animals compared to the other provinces.
The authorities should take the disease seriously as it not only impacts the farmers economically but would also impact Nepal's dairy industry as milk production is said to drop by 80 per cent in infected animals. Veterinary doctors recommend separating the infected cattle from the herd and providing appropriate treatment as well as a clean environment. Being able to spot the symptoms in time, which include the formation of small and large lumps on the body, high fever, swollen eyes, drooping ears and loss of appetite, among others, would help check the spread of the disease.
A version of this article appears in the print on July 5, 2023, of The Himalayan Times.
