| Ishwar Khanal |
Posted
on 16-Sep-02 08:33 PM
The Election Commission (EC) is believed to have finally decided which of the two Nepali Congress factions is to be recognised as the real one. A formal announcement is planned for Tuesday in favour of Girija Prasad Koirala, according to a source.
However, other sources claim the verdict has to be in favour of Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba. "If Deuba's faction is not to get official recognition of the Commission, what was the commission's indecision for?" said a Congressman.
Deuba has been under tremendous pressure recently to sacrifice his "corrupt" cabinet colleagues, which some analysts linked to the Commission' s decision.
Koirala has been saying publicly that if the Commission does not favour him, he would boycott the elections. This puts Koirala in league with the Maoist terrorists who are bent on disrupting the November 13 parliamentary elections.
"The commission has already taken a decision and an official announcement will be made on Tuesday," said a source at the commission.
The three-member Commission was spilt on the rival claims made by prime minister Deuba and Koirala, a four-time prime minister, following sharp differences on the question of the state of emergency. The chief of the Commission is believed to have sided with Deuba while the rest were in favour of Koirala.
One analyst said Koirala has been given legitimacy by the Commission to put him on the wrong foot. His reasoning; if the elections are not held due to Maoist terrorism, the blame can be laid at Koirala's door. If Koirala wins the party symbol of tree and four-star party flag at a time when certain quarters have doubts on the feasibility of holding elections on schedule.
The NC row was placed before the EC on June 19 when the breakaway faction of the party headed by Deuba lodged an application claiming that it was the legitimate party and should be given the party's symbol. The EC, on August 19, concluded hearings on the dispute but is yet to announce its verdict.
Lawyers of Deuba had argued that his faction had to call a convention out of compulsion and in a rush since time was "running out" and it would have "missed the June 19 deadline" - the last day to register a party at the commission.
However, lawyers of Koirala had argued that since Deuba was ousted from the party, he had lost the party status, and had no right to claim the party symbol. While Koirala and his party members had threatened to "boycott the parliamentary elections" if EC decided against them, the Deuba-led faction had claimed "it was against the spirit of the constitution to oust a ruling prime minister from even the ordinary membership of the party."
Referring to the so-called Baneshwor convention held by the Deuba faction a few months back, the Koirala group had also claimed that out of the 776 names of those representatives presented to the EC by the Deuba faction, 130 signatures and 50 names were incorrect, nine names were repeated and 190 names were fake.
Girija Prasad Koirala was elected NC president by the 10th general convention in Pokhara. Similarly, Deuba was elected leader of the parliamentary party according to Clause 36 (1) of the party constitution.
http://www.thehimalayantimes.com/Index.asp
|
| rat-a-tat |
Posted
on 17-Sep-02 12:55 AM
If I am not mistaken, it was the very same newspaper, The Himalayan Times (the newspaper this article has been lifted from), that reported some two weeks ago or something that the Nepali Congress election symbol was going out to the Deuba faction. It was reported with a by-line of Jan Sharma, I believe is the associate editor at THT, in the form of main news.
And now, the newspaper's suddenly chjanged its line. How fast can The Himalayan Times change its color??? Who'd follow such a newspaper that dilly-dallies with its readers. Your've lost your credibility THT. No thank you, It's always better to read The Kathmandu Post that has gone 12 pages from today.
|
