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Kathmandu Thursday February 15, 2001 Falgun 04, 2057.
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Oppn
adamant to pull PM down
Lower House disrupted for 3rd straight day
Post Report
KATHMANDU, Feb 14 - The scene in the House of
Representatives was no different today with the Opposition trooping onto the rostrum
shouting slogans demanding the Prime Minister’s resignation as soon as the Speaker
called for normal business.
The Opposition has been demanding the PM’s
resignation for his alleged involvement in the controversial RNAC-Lauda Air B-767 jet
lease deal. Even today, the fourth day of this Winter Session, the Opposition threatened
that they cannot allow the House to conduct normal business until the PM steps down.
For once, the rostrum almost witnessed a mini
scuffle with the marshals in the House trying to cordon off the area and the Opposition
lawmakers trying to take charge of it. Omkar Prasad Shrestha, the Minister of Culture,
Tourism and Civil Aviation, who had been called by the Speaker to make a statement, looked
on with a sheepish smile throughout from behind. The gherao of the rostrum was nearly
double the time than yesterday - eleven and a half minutes.
During this time, Speaker Taranath Ranabhat
appealed to the members thrice to go back to their seats but to no avail. The House has
been postponed till 11 a.m. tomorrow. Even earlier in the day, Ranabhat had appealed to
the members to help him allow conduct normal business, saying that enough has already been
said on the subject.
Nepal Sadbhavana Party lawmakers, once again,
remained in their seats despite their own call for Prime Minister Girija Prasad
Koirala’s resignation. Hridyesh Tripathi of the party alleged that the joint
memorandum of the five opposition parties asking the PM to step down was politically
motivated. "Have the Opposition given thought to the scenario after the PM
resigns?" However, having said that, Tripathi said that his party too wanted the
government to go.
Tripathi asked the Speaker to call a special
discussion in the House on the violence in the capital on December 26-28 when the Terai
people were beaten during the anti-Hrithik Roshan protests. "What happened during
those three days is the blackest spot on the nation for the last 50 years. If we keep mum,
the consequences for the nation will be very harmful."
He accused the Ministry of Information and
Communications and the three parties - Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist
Leninist), Communist Party of Nepal (Marxist Leninist) and Rastriya Prajatantra Party - of
behaving irresponsibly during the violence by their reckless statements. "The
villains in different parties must be exposed and brought to book."
Most of the time (a little over four hours)
today was centered around the opposition’s demand for Koirala’s ouster and the
spirited defence put up by the Nepali Congress (NC) lawmakers. The arguments have become
repetitive, with both the sides unable to offer anything new in their respective
"Oust PM" and "Protect PM" attempts.
However, Birendra Kanodia of NC, while staunchly
defending the Prime Minister, drew thumping of the desks from the Opposition benches and
caused red faces of the ruling MPs. Kanodia said that the Opposition had no business in
talking about the no-confidence proposal (accusing Koirala of involvement in the Lauda
deal) against the PM by the rebel NC MPs. He asserted that it was only meant for ensuring
inner-party democracy in the NC and not for outsiders to take advantage of. Even Kanodia
seemed to realize his goof up when the opposition started jeering him.
On the question of whether the Lauda jet was the
cheapest or not, the House was presented two different figures. While Pradip Nepal of
CPN-UML said the per seat cost of the wide-body jet was more than 19 US dollars, Narayan
Singh Pun of NC put the cost at 14.98 USD.
MP Nepal wanted to know the cost of leasing
Radio Nepal which, he charged, was running misinformation campaign against the Opposition
for their activity in the House.
Nepal accused the state-owned electronic media
of coining the term "shouting brigade" for their sloganeering yesterday. Even
yesterday, Radio Nepal was criticized for describing the opposition’s activity as
"unconstitutional".
Later, the Speaker inspected the tape recordings
in his chamber. However, his reaction was not known.
Today, the House was scheduled to take up the
Foreign Relations and Human Rights Committee report on the firing in Banke Prison,
Nepalgunj on January 14 and special discussion on the "Special Court, 2000".
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