Just a minute

It is essential to study what kind of mandate federlism has received from the people

The final decision making Nepal a federal state will be made by the Constituent Assembly if it is able to promulgate a constitution by May 28,2010. As a two-thirds majority is required for this purpose, the boundaries of the federal states and the division of powers between the centre and the states is still unclear. It is essential to examine what kind of mandate federalismhas received from the people of Nepal.

A strike of "Nepal banda" organised by the United People's Front in the Kathmandu Valley on Jan, 10 to protest against imposing federalism in Nepal was only partly successful. There were motorcycle rallies on the same day held by the Newa Autonomous Front which had supported federalism. The UPF had already organised anti-fed-eralism strikes in other parts of country in the earlier weeks.

It is interesting to note that there was no demand for federalism when Nepal was being governed under the 1990 Constitution after the advent of multi-party democdracy. Federalism didn't made by the Maoists in 1996 or the 12-point accord signed between the seven political parties and the Maoists insurgents in 2005. It didn't form part of the Interim Constitution when it was first promulgted in Januray 2007. The preamble of the IC was first amended in May 2008 which stated that Nepal would be an inclusive, democratic and federal state restructuring a unitary and centralised state inorder to end discrimination based on class, culture, gender, religion and region. It was added by the Fifth Amendment in June 2008 after the Constituent Assembly elections. The CA would determine the boundaries and distribution of powers between the centre and the federal states.

The mandate forfederalism could be considereds to have been derived from the manifestos of the political parties which participated in the CA polls held in April 2008 and wona decisive victory.
The manifesto of the CPN (Maoist) said that Nepal ws a multi-ethnic, multilingual, multi-cultural and multi-religious country haveing geographic diversity. Therefore,the unitary nature of the state would be restructured in a federal form on the basis of ethnic and regional self-determination taking in to accoun t its specialities. It added that sovereignty, independence and regional integrity would be further sterengthened.

The election manifesto of the Nepali Congress stated that Nepal would be a federal state ending the unitary and centralised nature of the state. The main factors in determining federal states would be national integrity, geographic factors, population, natural resoruces, economic feasibility and inter-relationship of the constituent units. The election manifestoof the CPN (UML) stated that a federal structure would be ade on the basis of ethnic, linguistic, cultural and geographical characteristics. It affirmed its policy to form such constituent units having similar ethnic, lingusistic, cultural historical and geographical factors.

The election manifesto of the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum(MFJ) talks about cration of such regions as Mithila, Awadh and Tharuhat inside the Madhes Autonomous Region. Similarly, the Tarai Madhes Loktantrik Party manifesto deals with ending internal colonialism and cereation of a Tarai-Mdhes region. The manifesto of the Sadbhavana Party is in Hindi and talks about cration of a fededral republic. The manifestoes of both the RPP and the RJP, consisting largely of former supporters of Panchayat, also support federalism. The RPP led by Kamal Thapa, home minister in Gtyanendra's cabineet, deals with a referendum to decide the fate of the monarchy and secularism, but supports autonomous federal states takintg into account ethnicity and geographic and economic fctors. The only paty opposed to federasism was Rastraiya Jana Morcha led by Chitra Bahadur K. C. which organised a "Nepal banda" recently.

Several question remain unanswered regarding federalsim inNepal. Such Madhes-based parties as the MJF, the TMPL and Sadbhavana are opposed to dividing Tarai Mades into several states. Creation of 14 states as proposed by the Maoists would require infrastructure to support them such as a state legislature, chief minister and state secretariat. Would a poor country like Nepal have resources to support such an expensive enterprise? If a smaller number of states (say five or six) wereto be created, it would be possible that infrastructure established in such regional centres as Dhankuta, Pokhara and Surkhet might servedthe purpose in a limited way.

Baburam Bhattarai has explained his party's policy regarding creation of ethnicity. (Mulyankan, Poush, 2066 B.S). He says that the wowrd "Jatiyata" used by the Maoists to denote ethnicity is actually "nationality" meaning a group having a simlar language, economy and psychology. He argues that in the ethnic fedral states such as Tamsaling, Magarat, Tamuwan, Newar, Mithila and Tharuwan, the "main" groups constitute between 20 to 40% of the population. Howerver, these federal states were named after the ethnic groups inorder to end their backwardness and to compensate them by giving them "priority" for a limited period of time. According to Baburam Bhattarai such prioritisation would be required for a decade or two.

The Nepali people should decide in a refrendum what kind of federalism they want for their country. Do they wan federalism based on ethnicity and language? How many federal states do they want? Neither the CA nor the political parties have the right to decide it instead of the sovereign people of Nepal.

This article published on The Kathmandu Post