Following the resignation of the then Speaker Bhuwan Kumar Pathak, an agreement has been reached among the ruling parties to elect a new Speaker, which has thrown the Provincial Assembly meeting into confusion.
The operation of the Bagmati Provincial Assembly is in limbo. Although the provincial government is preparing to operate the provincial assembly by the end of Kartik, the operation of the provincial assembly is in limbo due to the lack of consensus within the ruling party on the process of selecting the speaker.
The post is currently vacant after Speaker Bhuwan Kumar Pathak resigned immediately after the Gen-G movement on Bhadra 23 and 24. Pathak was elected as Speaker from the RPP.
Constitutionally, Deputy Speaker Apsara Chapagain has to read out Speaker Pathak's resignation letter in the upcoming Provincial Assembly meeting. The process of selecting the Speaker should be completed within 15 days of reading the letter. The meeting of the Central Committee of the Nepali Congress, the largest party in the House and the party leading the government, is currently ongoing. Due to which there is no agreement with the ruling UML on the issue of the Speaker.
That is why the date of the Provincial Assembly meeting has not been fixed. Bagmati Province Chief Minister Indra Bahadur Baniya said that the repair work of the assembly hall for the meeting has reached the final stage and the meeting of the Provincial Assembly will be decided after the meeting of the Congress Central Committee. 'The repair of the assembly hall for the meeting has reached the final stage. We will call the meeting by the end of Kartik,' said Chief Minister Baniya.
Government spokesperson and Minister for Economic Affairs and Planning Prabhat Tamang said that preparations are being made to hold the Provincial Assembly meeting within Kartik 24/25. ‘We will complete the process of selecting the Speaker within 15 days of the meeting. The government is making internal preparations for that,’ he said.
The previous meeting of the Nepali Congress parliamentary party has already decided to stake a claim to the Speaker post. It is understood that the Speaker’s claim will be weakened since the Deputy Speaker and the Provincial Chief are part of the CPN-UML. The third party in the house, the Maoist Center, has been saying that the Speaker should be selected by consensus.
Due to the Gen-G agitation on Bhadra 23 and 24, the old and newly constructed assembly halls of the Provincial Assembly at TCN in Hetauda-10 have been completely destroyed by fire. Due to this, there is a delay in holding the Provincial Assembly meeting.
The Provincial Government is preparing to hold the meeting in the assembly hall behind the Hetauda Sub-metropolitan City office in Hetauda-2. That building was also set on fire during the Gen-G agitation. The construction of the building is currently underway in agreement with the Hetauda Sub-metropolitan City. It is said that the hall will be reconstructed to be suitable for holding meetings within a few days.
The Provincial Assembly Secretariat has stated that preparations are being made to conduct the meeting, even though the necessary materials for conducting the parliament meeting, from chairs, sound systems to live broadcasting equipment, are being rented for the time being.
