Nepal political deadlock continues
On going political crisis in Nepal is continuous in Nepal with the conflicting parties firm on their stances. On Thursday, too, leaders of various political parties engaged in bilateral and tri-lateral talks to no avail.
The day started with Unified CPN (Maoist)'s office bearer's meeting. The meeting held at Maoist chairman Prachanda's residence in Naya Bazaar decided not to let the House run only to pass the budget. The decision came in response to ruling parties' request to allow the House run to pass the budget. Instead, the Maoists concluded that a single agreement should address all related problems.
The threshold of the problem is President's move to overrule erstwhile government's decision to sack the then army chief Rookmangud Katawal. Maoists have attached the incident with 'civilian supremacy', a term they coined after the very incident. The meaning is different from party to party and person to person.
The Maoists have defined 'civilian supremacy' as a provision/trend/tradition where a nation's army is directly in the control of an elected Prime Minister (or President- if he is the executive head).
The view of other political parties is: The Maoists did not follow a proper criteria while taking the decision on the army chief was being taken. They say, the Maoists decided to sack the army chief unilaterally without consent of other parties in the coalition.
In fact, only Maoist ministers (except one more minister from a Madhes-based party, who too had written a note of dissent on the decision) were present at the cabinet meeting which took the decision to sack the army chief.
That cabinet meeting decided to sack the army chief, appoint Kul Bahadur Khadka, the second-in-command of NA as the acting chief, and inform the President of the cabinet decisions. Normally, when a cabinet makes such decisions, it recommends the President to do so.
For example, in this case, the cabinet recommends the President to sack the army chief. A ceremonial President, like that of ours, does not have the authority to overrule such recommendation. He/She has to approve it as it is, as per the practice. Now, in this case, the cabinet took the decision on its own.
Most of the political parties and people in Nepal agree that the President had done a mistake by overruling the executive government's decision. However, they say, the Maoist had started the mistake by taking decision without consent of other parties.
The Maoists are not ready to accept their mistake, they are only pointing at the President's move.
The President, although he is formally as well as practically powerless (almost everybody knows the overruling of the army chief's dismissal was also sponsored, and not done by the President at his discretion), has also started defending his case in public functions these days.
His saying is: I had only followed the recommendation of the 18 parties and sent back the decision to the cabinet to reconsider.
The exact chain of events of that day (not to consider the converstations and activities behind the door) was like this:
- erstwhile PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal called the cabinet meeting with an intention to sack the army chief. Both army chief Rookmangud Katawal and second-in-command Kul Bahadur Khadka were called to Baluwatar during the meeting.
- UML and MPRF ministers boycotted the cabinet meeting. Only Maoist ministers except one minister from Terai Madhes Democratic Party (I forgot the name here) were present at the cabinet meet.
- at the outset of the meeting itself erstwhile PM Dahal proposed to dismiss the army chief saying the clarification he gave was not satisfactory. The cabinet unanimously (except the TMDP minister) approved it.
- Then erstwhile PM Dahal proposed the second-in-command Kul Bahadur Khadka be appointed as the acting army chief. Again, same process.
- Then the cabinet decided to inform the President of the cabinet decisions.
- The TMDP minister wrote a note of dissent on the decisions saying it should have been taken at the presence of all ministers.
- Khadka were waiting outside. Khadka was given the letter which mentioned he was appointed the acting chief. (Sorry, I mentioned army chief Katawal was also there at the meeting, I think he was not). He went to the army headquarters but could not do much.
- Katawal had not recieved the letter which mentioned he was sacked till late. So, for almost the entire day that day, confusion reined the army headquarters. However, no untoward incident happened, as Khadka took a back seat and did not do much activity. Katawal on the other side, still took the command.
- On the civilian front, some body from Baluwatar (I think it was Dahal itself) went with the letter of cabinet decisions to Shital Niwas and submitted to the President.
- Representatives of 18 political parties including UML, which was the second largest party in the coalition with one deputy PM and home minister and some important ministries, met at Nepali Congress's headquarter in Sanepa. (I am not sure if MPRF was present at the meeting).
- The eighteen parties decided to write to the PM to overrule the cabinet decision. So, they sent the letter to the President.
- Obviously, something cooked up (or was cooking up) behind the curtains. But, we can only guess what cooked up.
- A little after 10 pm that day, shortly after the President recieved such letter from the 18-parties, he sent a letter to the cabinet asking it to reconsider its decision by a consensus of all ministers in the cabinet, and wrote another letter to the army headquarters asking army chief Katawal to remain in position until further instructions. Interestingly Katawal had not gone home that night. He spent the entire night at the army headquarters sleeping only a few hours.
So, while defending himself, the President says he did not overrule, but only followed the recommendations of the eighteen parties and asked the cabinet to reconsider its decisions.
The next day, Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal called a final cabinet meeting and announced his resignation through a televised address to the nation in the afternoon saying he would rather resign than obey the orders of 'foreign lords.'
That is how this problem arose.
I will write more in my next post.
The day started with Unified CPN (Maoist)'s office bearer's meeting. The meeting held at Maoist chairman Prachanda's residence in Naya Bazaar decided not to let the House run only to pass the budget. The decision came in response to ruling parties' request to allow the House run to pass the budget. Instead, the Maoists concluded that a single agreement should address all related problems.
The threshold of the problem is President's move to overrule erstwhile government's decision to sack the then army chief Rookmangud Katawal. Maoists have attached the incident with 'civilian supremacy', a term they coined after the very incident. The meaning is different from party to party and person to person.
The Maoists have defined 'civilian supremacy' as a provision/trend/tradition where a nation's army is directly in the control of an elected Prime Minister (or President- if he is the executive head).
The view of other political parties is: The Maoists did not follow a proper criteria while taking the decision on the army chief was being taken. They say, the Maoists decided to sack the army chief unilaterally without consent of other parties in the coalition.
In fact, only Maoist ministers (except one more minister from a Madhes-based party, who too had written a note of dissent on the decision) were present at the cabinet meeting which took the decision to sack the army chief.
That cabinet meeting decided to sack the army chief, appoint Kul Bahadur Khadka, the second-in-command of NA as the acting chief, and inform the President of the cabinet decisions. Normally, when a cabinet makes such decisions, it recommends the President to do so.
For example, in this case, the cabinet recommends the President to sack the army chief. A ceremonial President, like that of ours, does not have the authority to overrule such recommendation. He/She has to approve it as it is, as per the practice. Now, in this case, the cabinet took the decision on its own.
Most of the political parties and people in Nepal agree that the President had done a mistake by overruling the executive government's decision. However, they say, the Maoist had started the mistake by taking decision without consent of other parties.
The Maoists are not ready to accept their mistake, they are only pointing at the President's move.
The President, although he is formally as well as practically powerless (almost everybody knows the overruling of the army chief's dismissal was also sponsored, and not done by the President at his discretion), has also started defending his case in public functions these days.
His saying is: I had only followed the recommendation of the 18 parties and sent back the decision to the cabinet to reconsider.
The exact chain of events of that day (not to consider the converstations and activities behind the door) was like this:
- erstwhile PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal called the cabinet meeting with an intention to sack the army chief. Both army chief Rookmangud Katawal and second-in-command Kul Bahadur Khadka were called to Baluwatar during the meeting.
- UML and MPRF ministers boycotted the cabinet meeting. Only Maoist ministers except one minister from Terai Madhes Democratic Party (I forgot the name here) were present at the cabinet meet.
- at the outset of the meeting itself erstwhile PM Dahal proposed to dismiss the army chief saying the clarification he gave was not satisfactory. The cabinet unanimously (except the TMDP minister) approved it.
- Then erstwhile PM Dahal proposed the second-in-command Kul Bahadur Khadka be appointed as the acting army chief. Again, same process.
- Then the cabinet decided to inform the President of the cabinet decisions.
- The TMDP minister wrote a note of dissent on the decisions saying it should have been taken at the presence of all ministers.
- Khadka were waiting outside. Khadka was given the letter which mentioned he was appointed the acting chief. (Sorry, I mentioned army chief Katawal was also there at the meeting, I think he was not). He went to the army headquarters but could not do much.
- Katawal had not recieved the letter which mentioned he was sacked till late. So, for almost the entire day that day, confusion reined the army headquarters. However, no untoward incident happened, as Khadka took a back seat and did not do much activity. Katawal on the other side, still took the command.
- On the civilian front, some body from Baluwatar (I think it was Dahal itself) went with the letter of cabinet decisions to Shital Niwas and submitted to the President.
- Representatives of 18 political parties including UML, which was the second largest party in the coalition with one deputy PM and home minister and some important ministries, met at Nepali Congress's headquarter in Sanepa. (I am not sure if MPRF was present at the meeting).
- The eighteen parties decided to write to the PM to overrule the cabinet decision. So, they sent the letter to the President.
- Obviously, something cooked up (or was cooking up) behind the curtains. But, we can only guess what cooked up.
- A little after 10 pm that day, shortly after the President recieved such letter from the 18-parties, he sent a letter to the cabinet asking it to reconsider its decision by a consensus of all ministers in the cabinet, and wrote another letter to the army headquarters asking army chief Katawal to remain in position until further instructions. Interestingly Katawal had not gone home that night. He spent the entire night at the army headquarters sleeping only a few hours.
So, while defending himself, the President says he did not overrule, but only followed the recommendations of the eighteen parties and asked the cabinet to reconsider its decisions.
The next day, Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal called a final cabinet meeting and announced his resignation through a televised address to the nation in the afternoon saying he would rather resign than obey the orders of 'foreign lords.'
That is how this problem arose.
I will write more in my next post.
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