Yesterday, President Ram Baran Yadav promulgated the Constitution of Nepal 2072 amidst a special ceremony at the Constituent Assembly (CA) Hall in New Baneshwor, Kathmandu. The seventh constitution of Nepal is the first one to be written by a CA and it institutionalises republicanism, federalism and secularism as its fundamental principles. However, the over one-month long protest against the statute continues in the Tarai. One protester was shot dead in Birjung just hours before the promulgation of the constitution. Against this backdrop, Bhadra Sharma and John Narayan Parajuli, spoke to the chief whip of CPN-UML, Agni Kharel on how the political parties reached a compromise, the concerns of the international community, the prospects of addressing the demands of the disgruntled Madhesi parties and the weakest provisions in the statute.

The constitution is finally here, but it must have been a challenging process. Can you tell us how the political parties were able to promulgate the constitution after so many years?

In the first CA, the political parties were only driven by their political ideology and election manifestos, firmly adhering to their individual political views, which made it difficult to reach an agreement on the constitution. This was one of the main reasons for the failure of the first CA. However, in the second CA, political parties gradually realised that it would not be possible to promulgate the constitution without being flexible. They slowly acknowledged the fact that consensus can only be reached by making compromises. For instance, initially, the UCPN (Maoist) was for a directly elected president as the head of government while we were for a directly elected prime minister. We had proposed a directly elected prime minister for the stability of the government. But we came to terms with the Congress as they were ready to accept a provision which forbids a vote of no confidence motion against the prime minister for at least two years after taking office and that a second vote of no confidence motion will not to passed for at least a year after the first one. The demands of the UCPN (Maoist) were not met, but they told us to continue with the constitution-drafting process by submitting a note of dissent. The promulgation of the constitution has thus only been possible because of compromise among the major parties.

There were talks of international pressure when the first CA was dissolved. Even this time, the international community has expressed concerns over lack of broad ownership.

The major reason behind the failure of the previous CA was the basis for federalism even though the two criteria—identity and capability—were agreed upon. The largest party in the first CA, UCPN (Maoist), should have been able to predict that the failure of the CA would adversely affect them, thus, they should have shown maximum flexibility to forge consensus, which they did not. The Maoist party wanted to federate the country based on their past promises to different ethnic groups during the People’s War and the Madhes Movement. Thus, they continued to stick to their position of federating the country on the basis of ethnicity. The NC and UML, however, did not agree to it.

In addition, the debate on state restructuring and federalism was a new concept in Nepal. Therefore, we did try to analyse the cases of different countries all over the world on this matter. Against this backdrop, the issue of whether Nepal should adopt ethnic federalism or not became a matter of debate in the international  arena as well. And accordingly, our foreign friends supported the cause. This definitely irritated our political actors. But the last CA failed due to our own internal issues and to blame international actors would be wrong. At the same time, to say that they were not involved in the process would not be right either.

Now that the constitution is promulgated, how do you plan to bring the disgruntled parties on board?

Yes, the constitution has been formally promulgated now. And the new constitution is very progressive as well. We are now officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal. Still, there might be people who are not completely satisfied with this constitution. Even I have reservations on many of the provisions. But the constitution is a product of compromise, and it is impossible to fully satisfy everyone. Some grievances of certain parties could not be fully addressed and they walked out of the CA before the voting on the constitution began.

The agitated parties, however, need to acknowledge that a huge majority in the CA has passed this constitution. There are a very few countries in the world that have passed their constitution with such a majority. Yet, we have been consistently saying that the constitution can be amended and we still want to resolve the contentious issues through dialogue with the agitated parties. So, we will be reaching out to the disgruntled parties and as long as they have genuine demands, we will address them.

As many political parties have disowned the constitution, how durable do you think the constitution is going to be?

What people need to remember is that this constitution can be amended. Except for a few vital aspects like sovereignty, integrity and issues of national interest, the constitution is very flexible. Many crucial provisions, such as federalism or republicanism among others, are also open to amendment. Many people had serious reservations about making the constitution so flexible, but we insisted that the constitution should be amended whenever the need arises. We believe that a constitution is an evolving document.  It is common practice around the world to amend a constitution, especially in its initial years of implementation.

The same thing is likely to happen in Nepal and it should. There are few things that need to be addressed. Therefore, the longevity of this constitution completely depends upon us. If the constitution is not even amended in difficult times in the future, then this constitution will also suffer the same fate as the 1990 constitution. But if we keep our minds open to revisions and amendments, I do not think there should be any problem with this constitution.

What do you think are the weakest aspects of this constitution?

Well, to be honest, I am not happy about the electoral system that we have agreed on. We reached an agreement regarding the electoral system—60 percent first-past-the-post (FTPT), 40 percent Proportional Representation (PR)—because the Congress was not ready to budge from the parliamentarian arrangement and without them on board, it would not have been possible to pass the constitution. In my opinion, the PR system should have been completely removed. The electoral arrangement should have been completely FTPT with reservation seats for the marginalised, such as the Dalits and women. In fact, the proportionate representation is not really required in our country for other ethnicities. As, since the 1990s, there have been plenty of ethnic political leaders representing their agendas.

For instance, there have always been Madhesi leaders representing the agendas of the Madhes, and the same holds for other ethnic groups as well, so I do not think that other ethnicities need reservation in Nepal. So we could have avoided the PR system altogether by just allocating reservation seats for Dalits and women under FTPT electoral system. This way, it would have been possible for a single party to win a majority, keeping the true democratic system alive—the one that wins governs the state while the ones that loose stay in the opposition. This is why while trying to reach an agreement with the NC, we emphasised that the electoral system needs to be stable. The PR system will make it impossible for a single party to be the sole winner in any election. Although I might be wrong, I feel that as long as a dual electoral system exists in our country, no political party on its own can win an outright majority. This system demands a new tradition of compromise in Nepali politics, and all the parties should be prepared to govern through a coalition government.  A very different approach than what has been practiced in Nepal so far, so this constitution does raise such crucial questions as how comfortable the political leaders are going to be in a coalition culture.