Paudel insists candidacy still valid

THT ONLINE

KATHMANDU: Nepali Congress parliamentary party leader and lone candidate of prime ministerial elections Ram Chandra Paudel today said that his candidacy would exist even in the next session of the parliament.

At a time, when the Unified CPN-Maoist and CPN-UML leaders are saying that his candidacy had naturally been terminated with the prorogation of the House, Paudel rejected the logic and said that the candidacy would exist in the next session as the earlier one failed to elect him the Prime Minister. The UCPN-M and UML have justified the logic saying that the parliament regulation is silent about whether a proposal is transferred to another session.

“A proposal, which is under proceedings in a session, is transferred naturally to another session. So, once the next session begins, the same PM’s runoff begins again. And, I will not back out from the race,” he told journalists after an interaction organised by Universal Peace Federation.

Paudel said that the peace process was in peril due to the Maoists’ tendency of not implementing the Comprehensive Peace Accord (CPA) and other past promises. Even after four years of CPA, the peace process could not make significant progress because of the Maoists’ reluctance in managing their combatants, Paudel said.

Congress leader Ramesh Lekhak said that the country was suffering from longstanding deadlock due to the Maoists’ non-implementation of the past agreements.