Speaker Agni Sapkota will initiate the process of electing deputy speaker.
Speaker Sapkota is scheduled to announce the time and date for electing deputy speaker during the meeting on Wednesday. He is reportedly preparing to conduct election within two days.
The post of deputy speaker is vacant since resignation of the then deputy speaker Shiva Maya Tumbahangphe before election of Agni Sapkota as speaker in January 2020 as she and Sapkota both came from the then ruling CPN. The Constitution requires House speaker and deputy speaker to come from different parties.
Lack of deputy speaker has been creating problems particularly in the Constitutional Council in the intervening period.
The Constitutional Council chaired by the prime minister (PM) includes chief justice (CJ), House speaker and deputy speaker, National Assembly chairman and the main opposition leader.
The government has been widely slammed including from within ruling Nepali Congress (NC) after it registered a bill in the National Assembly to amend the act related to the Constitutional Council in a way that appointments at constitutional bodies can be made by just three members of the Constitutional Council instead of filling the long-vacant post of deputy speaker.
The ruling coalition now has opted to hold election for deputy speaker following the criticism.
