The Constituent Assembly (CA) term has been extended by another three months. The Legislature Parliament passed the ninth amendment to the interim constitution Sunday morning to extend the CA term.
The parliament has changed the phrase ‘the term of CA will be three years from the date of its first meeting’ mentioned in Article 64 of the interim constitution to ‘the term of CA will be three years and three months from the date of its first meeting.’
The CA term was extended after a five-point agreement among largest three political parties in the CA – Unified CPN (Maoist), Nepali Congress (NC) and UML.
Although, United Democratic Madhesi Front had also initially given consent to the CA term extension, it later stayed neutral at the time of voting saying the agreement was still not enough to address the cause of the Madhes.
All other lawmakers except those of Rastriya Prajatantra Party Nepal voted for the constitution amendment bill filed by the government. RPP-N voted against it.
This is the second time the CA term has been extended. Initially elected for a period of two years in 2008 the CA term had been extended for a period of one year on May 28 last year. Political parties sought another extension as the task of constitution drafting has still not been completed. nepalnews.com
