National flag to remain unchanged

KATHMANDU, Jan 16: Top leaders of the big three parties have agreed not to change the country´s national flag in the new constitution.

Pushpa Kamal Dahal of UCPN (Maoist), Ram Chandra Paudel of Nepali Congress (NC) and Jhalanath Khanal of CPN-UML, along with some second rung leaders from the three parties, reached understanding to this effect at a meeting at Singha Durbar on Sunday. Constituent Assembly Chairman Subas Nembang was also present at the meeting.

Claiming that the existing flag represents the feudal monarchial system, Maoist leaders had been insisting that some changes must be made to the national flag to recognize the recent political movements.

"We have agreed to not make any changes to the flag. We will, however, change the explanatory notes on the flag in the constitution so as to explain its features as per the spirit of the recent political movements and to recognize the recent political achievements," said a leader present at the meeting.

The Maoist proposal had also been defeated in a voting at the 64-member Constitutional Committee (CC) of the CA last year. Despite the defeat the Maoists had been insisting that the flag must be changed but the NC, UML and some other political parties were vehemently against the Maoist demand.

The leaders also reached an understanding to drop the idea of imposing any threshold for recognition as a national political party in the new constitution. While leaders from some of the major parties proposed that a provision be included to make it mandatory that any party must secure three percent of the total votes cast across the country in a general election to get the recognition as a national political party, small parties strongly opposed it.

There was a similar provision of three percent threshold in the 1990 constitution. Any political party failing to pass the threshold would not be entitled to state facilities provided to a national political party.

A leader from a fringe party stated that the recognition makes a significant difference for a political party also because the general public and the diplomatic communities deal with the party accordingly.

Candidates from such parties have to contest the elections as independents because the Election Commission doesn´t provide common election symbol to such parties.

A leader present at the meeting informed that they would finalize the understanding reached among the top leaders only after the all-party meeting endorses their recommendations on Monday.

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