Maoists for changeable pluralism, HR, press freedom

KATHMANDU, Dec 10: UCPN (Maoist) leaders have gone against writing pluralism, fundamental rights, human rights and press freedom as non-amendable provisions in the new constitution.

While the Nepali Congress (NC) and CPN-UML wanted these universal principles of democracy as unchangeable, Maoists vehemently opposed the proposal at a meeting of the high-level taskforce formed to settle disputes in constitution writing on Thursday.


Maoists have said there is no need to define any provision as unchangeable. "If it is essential, only sovereignty, republicanism and federalism can be acceptable for all as unchangeable in the new constitution," said Dev Gurung, Maoist leader and member of the high-level taskforce.

NC leader and member of the taskforce Ramesh Lekhak said his party wants that pluralism, fundamental rights, human rights, press freedom, periodic elections, independent judiciary, republicanism, federalism and sovereignty should be declared unchangeable.

Gurung argued that drafting a constitution with a long list of subjects as unchangeable would make the statute very rigid and problematic. "That will do nothing good but create a ground for movements and revolts," Gurung said.

Lekhak said if there is a practical problem in incorporating a list of provisions as unchangeable, it could be described in general terms. "We can shorten it by saying that federalism, republicanism and basic democratic principles including press freedom and rule of law," he explained.

But Gurung argued that as press freedom and human rights are vague terms, declaring them as unchangeable would create problems in future. "These are quite vague terms. We may need to interpret what human rights is and is not. So is the case with press freedom," he said. "Once we define them as unchangeable it can be problematic."

On pluralism, Gurung threw a counter question, how Maoists can accept the term as unchangeable while they had already objected to the idea of even mentioning it in the statute.

Leaders at the taskforce meeting also disputed about the national flag as well. Maoists have pushed for some modifications in the present flag while NC and other political parties are against making any changes in it.

Lekhak sees no point of making any changes in the national flag. "At the most, in view of changed context, we can redefine our flag in the explanatory notes," he said.

But Gurung insists that there must be some modifications in the flag at least to reflect the achievements attained from the recent popular movements. At the meeting, Gurung proposed that the 12-points in the sun and eight points in the moon given in the flag be changed and set the number of points signifying a meaning of the unity among the multicultural, multilingual, multiethnic communities or among the proposed provinces. "What all we want is that the spirit of the changes should be reflected in the flag," he further explained.

The leaders, however, settled around 14 disputes at the meeting on Thursday. So far, the taskforce, which is headed by Maoist Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal, has sorted out altogether around 115 differences in the constitution writing.

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