Deputy parliamentary party leader of Communist Party of Nepal (CPN) Subas Chandra Nembang has stated both speaker and deputy speaker of the House of Representatives (HoR) can continue despite the constitution requiring that they should be from different parties.
Krishna Bahadur Mahara of the then CPN (Maoist Center) is currently the speaker while Shiv Maya Tumbamfe of the then CPN-UML is deputy speaker. The two parties have since unified to form CPN.
Article 91(2) of the constitution requires speaker and deputy speaker of HoR to be from different parties.
But Nembang, a lawyer by training and a former Constituent Assembly (CA) chairman, argues that both the speaker and the deputy speaker can continue as they are no longer associated with any party. "Both of them have resigned before filing nominations. Their resignations have also been accepted. They are not associated with our party now," Nembang told Setopati.
Clause 33(1) of the act related to political parties, however, clearly states that the lawmaker elected on a party's ticket would be counted from that party even if the lawmaker resigns.
The constitution allows the members of the same party from being speaker and deputy speaker only if there is no representation of more than one party in the HoR or no candidacy is filed by more than one party in spite of representation.
There are currently four national parties in the HoR after unification of UML and Maoist Center. The main opposition Nepali Congress (NC) had supported Mahara for speaker but had fielded Pushpa Bhusal for the post of deputy speaker against Tumbamfe.
NC lawmaker Minendra Rijal refuted Nembang's argument and pointed that the constitution clearly states that both speaker and deputy speaker cannot be from a single party. "They must put the proposal forward taking the constitution and act related to political parties into consideration," Rijal argued. "That members of a same party cannot serve in both the positions is clearly stated."
The constitution does not say that chairman and vice chairman of the National Assembly should be from different parties but it requires provincial speakers and deputy speakers to be from separate parties as in the case of HoR.
CPN currently has both speakers and deputy speakers in six of the seven provinces.
