The Nobel peace prize laureate, who personally handed over his suggestion to Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala on Saturday, called his peace plan a “balanced position”.
KATHMANDU: Former US president Jimmy Carter on Saturday ended his four-day visit to Nepal by drawing up a peace formula that deals a fresh blow to embattled King Gyanendra, endorsing the Maoist demand to abolish monarchy immediately through a parliamentary proclamation and putting pressure on the government to implement it by virtue of his endorsement.
The Nobel peace prize laureate, who personally handed over his suggestion to Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala on Saturday, called his peace plan a “balanced position” which could be modified by the major parties.
“The proposals I have made are an adequate compromise to the demands I have met from the leaders of various parties,” Carter said at the end of the peace mission during which he met Koirala, Maoist chief Prachanda, three deputy commanders of the Maoists’ guerrilla army, Election Commission officials, foreign envoys, and leaders of marginalised groups.
To end the deadlock gripping Nepal’s peace process since September, when the Maoists quit the government and began demanding the immediate abolition of the monarchy as well as a fully proportional electoral system, Carter has suggested a compromise formula. The octogenarian leader said an overwhelming majority of the parties had said they supported the abolition of Nepal’s two centuries old monarchy.
So the former President is suggesting that parliament proclaim Nepal a republic, as per the Maoists’ demand.
However, he is suggesting that the implementation be effected after a constituent assembly — that will write a new constitution — is convened after an election.
He is also advocating a mixed election system in which 70 per cent of the seats would be chosen on the basis of proportional representation and the remaining 30 per cent on a first-past-the-post basis.
Currently, the constitution prescribes a mixed electoral system for the constituent assembly polls with 50 per cent of the seats to be filled on a first-past-the-post system and the remaining 50 per cent through the proportional system.
While the constitution provides for a 497-member constituent assembly in which 17 members are to be nominated by the Prime Minister, Carter suggests that eight members be chosen automatically from the three major parties — the Nepali Congress, the Maoists and their new ally in parliament, the Communist Party of Nepal-Unified Marxist Leninist.
With an internationally respected figure like Carter endorsing the immediate abolition of monarchy, it is a boost for the Maoists and brings further pressure on Koirala, who is resisting the Maoist demands.
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